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EVIDENCE 

OF THE 

TRUTH OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION 

DERIVED FROM THE LITERAL FULFILMENT OF 

PROPHECY; 

PARTICULARLY AS ILLUSTRATED BY THE HISTORY OF 

THE JEWS, AND BY THE DISCOVERIES OF 

RECENT TRAVELLERS. 



BY THE 

REV. ALEXANDER KEITH. 

i t 

MINISTER OF ST. CYRUS, KINCARDINESHIRE. 

FROM THE SIXTH EDINBURGH EDITION. 



Opinionum commenta dies delet, Naturae judicia confirmat. 

Cic. De Nat. Deo • 



NEW- YORK. 

PUBLISHED BY HARPER k BROTHERS, 
NO. 82 CLIFF-STREET. 

i 8 5 0. 




3^ 



//O' 

|f5» 









PREFACE 



THE FIRST EDITION. 



The following pages are presented to the public in 
the hope that they may not be altogether unproductive 
of good. The idea of the propriety of such a publica- 
tion was first suggested to the writer in consequence 
of a conversation with a person who disbelieved the 
truth of Christianity, but whose mind seemed to be 
considerably affected even by a slight allusion to the 
argument from Prophecy. Having endeavoured in 
vain to obtain, for his perusal, any concise treatise on 
the Prophecies, considered exclusively as a matter of 
evidex\ce, — and having failed in soliciting others to 
undertake the work, who were far better qualified for 
the execution of it, — the writer was induced to make 
the attempt, and to endeavour to bring the subject into 
view. He was urged and encouraged to the prosecu- 
tion of it by his worthy and learned friend, the Rev. 
Mr. Brewster, of Craig, to whom, and to another 
esteemed friend, the Rev. Dr. Mitchell, of Kemnay, 
by whose able critical remarks he has profited much, 
he owes, at least, this acknowledgment of his obli- 
gations. 

Unbelievers are often most unreasonably averse to 
listen to any arguments, which establish the truth of 
Christianity, that may be urged by a clergyman ; and 
it was therefore intended to have published this sketch 
anonymously. The advice of the Publishers, and of 



VI PREFACE. 

others, prevented this. Testimony the most unexcep- 
tionable has, however, been adduced to substantiate 
the facts which verify the different Prophecies ; and 
that testimony cannot be invalidated, by whomsoever 
it may be produced. 

In the following Essay the argument is brought 
within narrow limits. Those Prophecies are not in- 
cluded which were fulfilled previously to the era of 
the last of the Prophets, or of which the meaning is 
obscure, or the application doubtful. And the only 
question to be resolved is, Whether there be any 
clear predictions literally accomplished, which, from 
their nature and their number, demonstrate that the 
Scriptures are the dictates of inspiration, or that the 
spirit of Prophecy is the testimony of Jesus. 



PREFACE 



THE SECOND EDITION. 



in the present edition the title has been partly 
altered, in order to convey a more distinct idea of the 
object of the treatise ; and the fifth chapter, in par- 
ticular, has been enlarged much beyond the original 
views of the author. He has not only endeavoured 
to obtain a more complete account of the existing state 
of Judea and of the surrounding countries from the 
published works of travellers of authority, but he has 
derived much important information from the Travels 
in Egypt, Syria, fyc, by the Honourable Charles Leo- 
nard Irby and James Mangles, Esq., F.R..S., Com- 
manders in the Royal Navy, which were printed for 
private distribution, with a copy of which, with full 
permission to make use of its contents, they kindly 
tarnished him., General Stratton also favoured him 
with the perusal and use of his valuable manuscript 
Travels, to which, in several instances, reference is 
made. A brief description of the Journey of Captains 
Irby and Mangles, in company with Mr. Bankes and 
Mr. Legh, is published in Dr. MacmichaeVs Journey 
to Constantinople, 

The researches of travellers in Palestine have been 
so abundant, and the prophecies thereby verified are 
so numerous and distinct, that no labour is requisite 
for elucidating their truth but to examine and compare 
the predictions and the events; and the literal pro 



Viii PREFACE. 

phecies need no other interpretation than the literal 
facts. 

Though well aware that any one who seeks to illus- 
trate the external evidence of the truth of Christianity 
may be said to stand only at the outer porch of the 
temple of Christian Faith, yet the writer of these pages 
humbly hopes that he may be permitted to point to a 
way, without a stumbling-block, by which some who 
may be merely the proselytes of the gate, or others 
who would pass altogether by, may be enabled to enter 
into that edifice of Divine architecture, fitly framed 
together, which is filled with all the riches of mercy, 
with all the beauties of holiness, and with all the light 
of truth. 



PREFACE 

TO 

THE FIFTH EDITION. 



Prophecy has been rightly called a " growing evi- 
dence." Of late years that evidence has greatly accu- 
mulated. And after the successive additions which 
have been made to this treatise, no one can be more 
conscious than the author how very far it yet comes 
short of fully exhibiting the evidence of prophecy. 

It is not in times like the present that, on such a 
subject, the precept of Horace — nonum prematur in 
annum — can be regarded. Had it been complied with 
in the present instance, the following Essay would not 
yet have been before the public. — But the desire of 
any credit, as an author, yielded to the better hope, as 
a Christian, that the treatise, in however imperfect a 
form, might " not be altogether unproductive of good," 
— and that hope has not been vain. 

For facilitating and promoting the means of its use- 
fulness to a degree which he ventured not even to 
hope, his grateful acknowledgments are due to the 
Right Hon. Lord Bexley ; and never was a debt more 
freely paid than he tenders them. To the public notice 
which he took of the volume, his lordship afterward 
^dded a lively interest in the publication of an abridg- 
ment of it, the concluding chapter of which, on the 
Seven Churches of Asia, was written entirely at his 
suggestion. And. at his expense, the Abridgment has 
been stereotyped, and published in English and in 



X PREFACE, 

French, by the Religious Tract Society ; and is now 
also in the course of publication, in the same manner, 
in German. — While it was in preparation, a tract on 
the prophecies concerning Ammon, Moab, and Philistia 
was drawn up by one of the secretaries of the Reli- 
gious Tract Society, of which about twenty thousand 
copies have already been sold. 

The additional matter in the present volume refers 
chiefly to Judea and Babylonia. 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER I. 

Introduction. 

Page 

Importance of the Subject 13 

General View of the Evidence 16 

On the Obscurity of Prophecy 17 

Nature of Proof from Prophecy 18 

Antiquity of the Old Testament Scriptures 19 

Subjects of Prophecy 21 

CHAPTER n. 

Prophecies concerning Christ and the Christian Religion. 

The Coming of the Messiah 23 

Time of Christ's Advent, &c. 25 

The Place of his Birth , . . . . 30 

The Manner of his Life 33 

His Character, &c 33 

The Manner of his Death . . . 34 

Nature of the Christian Religion 40 

Its Rejection by the Jews, <fcc. 40 

Propagation and Extent of Christianity, &c. 43 

CHAPTER III. 
The Destruction of Jerusalem 50 

CHAPTER IV. 
The Jews 64 

CHAPTER V. 

The Land of Judea and circumjacent Countries 82 

The ancient Fertility of Judea 91 

The Cities of Judea, &c 93 

The Countries, Inhabitants, &c 98 

Partial Exceptions from Desolations, &c 115 

Samaria, &c 117 

Jerusalem 118 

Ammcn 121 

Moab 126 

Edom, or Idumea 135 

Philistia 168 

Gaza, Ashkelon, Ekron, &c. 171 

Lebanon „ 174 



Xll CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER VI. 

Fa?e 

Nineveh 178 

Babylon 182 

Tyre 237 

Egypt 241 

CHAPTER VII. 

The Arabs 247 

Slavery of the Africans 249 

European Colonies in Africa 251 

CHAPTER Vin. 
The Seven Churches or Asia 253 

CHAPTER IX. 

Prophecy of the Things noted in the Scriptures of Truth 265 

Macedonian Empire, Alexander the Great 266 

Kings of Syria and Egypt 266 

Roman Empire 268 

Long-continued spiritual Tyranny 268 

Turkish Empire 270 

Conclusion 273 



EVIDENCE 



PROPHECY. 



INTRODUCTION. 

No subject can be of greater importance, either to the 
unbeliever or to the Christian, than an investigation of 
the evidence of Christianity. The former, if his mind 
be not fettered by the strongest prejudice, and if he be 
actuated in the least by a spirit of- free and fair inquiry, 
cannot disavow his obligation to examine its claims to a 
divine origin. He cannot rest secure in his unbelief, to 
the satisfaction of his own mind, without manifest dan- 
ger of the most fatal error, till he has impartially weighed 
all the reasons that may be urged on its behalf. The 
proof of a negative is acknowledged and felt to be dif- 
ficult ; and it can never, in any case, be attained till all 
direct and positive evidence to the contrary be com- 
pletely destroyed. And this, at least, must be done 
before it can be proved that Christianity is not true. 
Without this careful and candid examination, all gratui- 
tous assumptions and fanciful speculations, all hypotheti- 
cal reasonings or analogical inferences, that seem to 
militate against the truth of religion, maybe totally erro- 
neous ; and though they may tend to excite a transient 
doubt, they cannot justify a settled unbelief. Being ex- 
clusively regarded, or being united to a misapprehension 
of the real nature of the Christian religion, the under- 
standing may embrace them as convincing; but such 
conviction is neither rational nor consistent — it is only 
a misapplication of the name of freethinking. For, as 
Christianity appeals to reason and submits its credentials 
—as it courts and commands the most hying scrutiny — 



14 INTRODUCTION. 

that scrutiny the unbeliever is bound, upon his own prm~ 
ciples, to engage in. If he be fearless of wavering in 
his unbelief, he will not shrink from the inquiry ; or, if 
truth be his object, he will not resist the only means of 
its attainment — that he may either disprove what he 
could only doubt o* before, or yield to the conviction of 
positive evidence and undoubted truth. This unhesi- 
tating challenge religion gives ; and that man is neither 
a champion of infidelity, nor a lover of wisdom or of 
truth, who will disown or decline it. 

To the believer such a subject is equally important 
and interesting. The apathy of nominal Christians, in 
the present day, is often contrasted with the zeal of 
those who first became obedient to the faith. The 
moral influence of the Christian religion is not what it 
has been, or what it ought to be. The difference in the 
character of its professors may be greatly attributed to 
a fainter impression and less confident assurance of its 
truth. Those early converts who witnessed the mira- 
cles of our Lord and of his apostles, and heard their divine 
doctrine, and they who received the immediate tradition 
of those who both saw and heard them, and who could 
themselves compare the moral darkness from which they 
had emerged with the marvellous light of the gospel, 
founded their faith upon evidence ; possessed the firmest 
conviction of the truth ; were distinguished by their vir- 
tues as well as by their profession, according to the 
testimony even of their enemies ;* cherished the consola- 
tions, and were inspired by the hopes of religion ; and 
lived and died, actuated by the hope of immortality and 
the certainty of a future state. The contrast, unhappily, 
needs no elucidation. The lives of professing Chris- 
tians, in general, cease to add a confirmation to the truth 
of Christianity, when they have often been the plea of 
infidels against it. Yet religion and human nature are 
still the same as they were when men were first called 
Christians, and when the believers in Jesus dishonoured 
not his name. But they sought more than a passive and 
unexamining belief. They knew in whom they believed ; 
they felt the power of every truth which they professed. 
And the same cause, in active operation, would be pro- 
ductive of the same effects. The same strong and un- 
wavering faith established on reason and conscious con- 

* Piinii Epis. 1. 10, ep. 97. 



INTRODUCTION. 1 5 

viction, would be creative of the same peace and joy in 
believing, and of all their accompanying fruits. And, as 
a means of destroying the distinction, wherever it exists, 
between the profession and the reality of faith, it is ever 
the prescribed duty of all who profess to believe in the 
gospel to search and to try — " to prove all things, and 
hold fast to that which is good ;" and to " be able to give 
an answer to every one that asketh them a reason of the 
hope that is in them." 

To the sincere Christian it must ever be an object of 
the highest interest to search into the reason of his 
hope. The farther that he searches, the firmer will be 
his belief. Knowledge is the fruit of mental labour — 
the food and the feast of the mind. In the pursuit of 
knowledge, the greater the excellence of the subject of 
inquiry, the deeper ought to be the interest, the more 
ardent the investigation, and the dearer to the mind the 
acquisition of the truth. And that knowledge which 
immediately affects the soul, which tends to exalt the 
moral nature and enlarge the religious capacities of man, 
which pertains to eternity, which leads not merely to 
the contemplation of the works of the great Architect 
of the universe, but seeks also to discover an accredited 
revelation of his will and a way to his favour — and 
which rests not in its progress till it find assurance of 
faith or complete conviction, a witness without, as well 
as a witness within, is surely " like unto a treasure which 
a man found hid in a field, and sold all that he had and 
bought it." And it is delightful to have every doubt re- 
moved by the positive proof of the truth of Christianity 
— to feel that conviction of its certainty, which infidelity 
can never impart to her votaries, — and to receive that as- 
surance of the faith, which is as superior in the hope 
which it communicates, as in the certainty on which it 
rests, to the cheerless and disquieting doubts of the un- 
believing mind. Instead of being a mere prejudice of 
education, which may be easily shaken, belief, thus 
founded on reason, becomes fixed and immoveable ; and 
all the scofhngs of the scorner, and speculations of 
the infidel, lie as lightly on the mind, or pass as imper- 
ceptibly over it, and make as little impression there as 
the spray upon a rock. 

In premising a few remarks, introductory to a Sketch 
of the Prophecies, little can be said on the general and 
comprehensive evidence of Christianity. The selection 



16 INTRODUCTION. 

of a part implies no disparagement to the whole. Ample 
means for the confirmation of our faith are within our 
reach. Newton, Bacon, and Locke, whose names stand 
pre-eminent in human science, to which they opened a 
path not penetrated before, found proof sufficient for the 
complete satisfaction of their minds. The internal evi- 
dence could not be stronger than it is. There are mani- 
fold instances of undesigned coincidences in the Acts 
and Epistles of the Apostles, which give intrinsic proof 
that they are genuine and authentic. No better pre- 
cepts, no stronger motives than the gospel contains 
have ever been inculcated. No system of religion has 
ever existed in the world at all to be compared to it : 
and none can be conceived more completely adapted to 
the necessities and nature of a sinful being like man, en- 
dowed with the faculty of reason and with capacities of 
religion. And the miracles were of such a nature as ex- 
cluded the idea of artifice or delusion; — they were 
wrought openly in the presence of multitudes — they tes- 
tified the benevolence of a Saviour, as well as the power 
of the Son of God. The disciples of Christ could not be 
deceived respecting them ; for they were themselves 
endowed with the gift of tongues, and of prophesying, 
and with the power of working miracles ; they devoted 
their lives to the propagation of the gospel, in opposition 
to every human interest, and amid continual sufferings. 
The Christian religion was speedily propagated through- 
out the whole extent of the Roman empire, and even 
beyond its bounds. The written testimony remains of 
many who became converts to the truth, and martyrs to 
its cause ; and the most zealous and active enemies of 
our faith acknowledged the truth of the miracles and 
attributed them to the agency of evil spirits. Yet all 
this accumulation of evidence is disregarded, and every 
testimony is rejected unheard, because ages have since 
intervened, and because it bears witness to works that 
are miraculous. Though these general objections against 
the truth of Christianity have been ably answered and 
exposed, yet they may fairly be adduced as confirmatory 
of the proof which results from the fulfilment of prophecy, . 
and as binding infidels to its investigation. For it sup- 
plies that evidence which the enemies of religion, or 
those who are weak in the faith, would require, which 
applies to the present time, and which stands not in need 
of any testimony, — which is always attainable by the 



INTRODUCTION. 17 

researches of the inquisitive, and often obvious to the 
notice of all, — and which past, present, and coming 
events alike unite in verifying ; — it affords an increasing 
evidence, and receives additional attestations in each 
succeeding age. 

But, while some subterfuge has been sought for eva- 
ding the force of the internal evidence, and the convic- 
tion which a belief in the miracles would infallibly pro- 
duce, and while every collateral proof is neglected, the 
prophecies also are set aside without investigation, as 
of too vague and indefinite a nature to be applied, with 
certainty, to the history either of past ages or of the 
present. A very faint view of the prophecies of the 
Old and New Testaments will suffice to rectify this 
equally easy and erroneous conclusion. Although some 
of the prophecies, separately considered, may appear 
ambiguous and obscure ; yet a general view of them all 
— of the harmony which prevails throughout the pro- 
phecies — and of their adaptation to the facts they pre- 
dict, must strike the mind of the most careless inquirer 
with an apprehension that they are the dictates of Om- 
niscience. But many of the prophecies are as explicit 
and direct as it is possible that they could have been ; 
and, as history confirms their truth, so they sometimes 
tend to its illustration, of which our future inquiry will 
furnish us with examples. And if the prophetical part 
of Scripture which refers to the rise and fall of king- 
doms had been more explicit than it is, it would have 
appeared to encroach on the free agency of man — it 
would have been a communication of the foreknowledge 
of events which men would have grossly abused and 
perverted to other purposes rather than to the establish- 
ment of the truth ; and instead of being a stronger evi- 
dence of Christianity, it would have been considered as 
the cause of the accomplishment of the events predicted, 
by the unity and combination it would have excited 
among Christians ; and thus have afforded to the unbe- 
liever a more reasonable objection against the evidence 
of prophecy than any that can be now alleged. It is in 
cases wherein they could not be abused, or wherein the 
agents instrumental in their fulfilment were utterly igno- 
rant of their existence, that the prophecies are as de- 
scriptive as history itself. But whenever the knowledge 
of future events would have proved prejudicial to the 
peace and happiness of the world, they are couched in 



18 INTRODUCTION. 

allegory, which their accomplishment alone can expound, 
— and drawn with that degree of light and shade that the 
faithfulness of the picture may best be seen from the 
proper point of observation, — the period of their com- 
pletion. Prophecy must thus, in many instances, have 
that darkness which is impenetrable at first, as well as 
that light which shall be able to dispel every doubt at 
last; and, as it cannot be an evidence of Christianity 
until the event demonstrate its own truth, it may remain 
obscure till history become its interpreter, and not be per 
fectly obvious till the fulfilment of the whole series with 
which it is connected. But the general and often sola 
objection against the evidence from the prophecies — that 
they are all vague and ambiguous — may best be answered 
and set aside by a simple exhibition of those numerous 
and distinct predictions which have been literally accom- 
plished ; and therefore to this limited view of them the 
following pages shall chiefly be confined. 

Little need be said on the nature of proof from pro- 
phecy. That it is the effect of divine interposition cannot 
be disputed. It is equivalent to any miracle, and is of 
itself evidently miraculous. The foreknowledge of the 
actions of free and intelligent agents is one of the most 
incomprehensible attributes of the Deity ; and is exclu- 
sively a divine perfection. He knows the determination 
of the human will, though he hath left it free — the past, 
the present, and the future are alike open to his view, 
and to his alone : and there can be no stronger proof of 
the interposition of the Most High than that which pro- 
phecy affords. Of all the attributes of the God of the 
universe, his prescience has bewildered and baffled the 
most all the powers of human conception ; and an evi- 
dence of the exercise of this perfection in the revelation 
of what the infinite mind alone could make known is 
the seal of God, which can never be counterfeited, af- 
fixed to the truth which it attests. Whether that evi- 
dence has been afforded is a matter of investigation ; but 
if it has unquestionably been given, the effect of super- 
human agency is apparent, and the truth of what it was 
given to prove does not admit of a doubt. If the pro- 
phecies of the Scriptures can be proved to be genuine — 
if they be of such a nature as no foresight of man could 
possibly have predicted — if the events foretold in them 
were described hundreds or even thousands of years be- 
fore those events became parts of the history of man — 



INTRODUCTION. 19 

and if the history itself correspond with the prediction, 
then the evidence which the prophecies impart is a sign 
and a wonder to every age : no clearer testimony or 
greater assurance of the truth can be given, and if men 
do not believe Moses and the prophets, neither would 
they be persuaded though one arose from the dead. 
Even if one were to rise from the dead, evidence of the 
fact must precede conviction ; and if the mind be satis- 
fied of the truth of prophecy, the result in either case 
is the same. The voice of Omnipotence alone could call 
the dead from the tomb — the voice of Omniscience alone 
could tell all that lay hid in dark futurity, which to man 
is as impenetrable as the mansions of the dead — and both 
are alike the voice of God. 

Of the antiquity of the Scriptures there is the amplest 
proof. The books of the Old Testament were not, like 
other writings, detached and unconnected efforts of 
genius and research, or mere subjects of amusement or 
instruction. They were essential to the constitution of 
the Jewish state ; — the possession of them was a great 
cause of the peculiarities of that people ; — and they con- 
tain their moral and their civil law, and their history, as 
well as the prophecies, of which they were the records 
and the guardians. They were received by the Jews as 
of divine authority ; and as such they were published 
and preserved. They were proved to be ancient eigh- 
teen hundred years ago.* Instead of being secluded 
from observation, they were translated into Greek above 
two hundred and fifty years before the Christian era ; 
and they were read in the synagogues every Sabbath- 
day. The most ancient part of them was received, as 
divinely inspired, and was preserved in their own lan- 
guage by the Samaritans, who were at enmity with the 
Jews. They have ever been sacredly kept unaltered, in 
a more remarkable degree, and with more scrupulous 
care than any other compositions whatever-! And the 
antiquity and authenticity of them rest so little on Chiis- 

* Joseph us c. Apion. 

t There are not wanting proofs of the most scrupulous care of the Hebrew 
text on the part of the Jews: they have counted the large and small sections, 
the verses, the words, and even the letters in some of the books. They have 
likewise reckoned which is the middle letter of the Pentateuch— which is the 
middle clause of each book — and how many times each letter of the alphabet 
occurs in all the Hebrew Scriptures. This, at least, shows that the Jews 
were religiously careful to preserve the literal sense of Scnpture.--JJ/e?i\s 
Mod. Judaism. Simon Crit. Hist. 1, 26. 



20 INTRODUCTION. 

tian testimony alone, that it is from the records of out 
enemies that they are confirmed, and from which is de^ 
rived the evidence of our faith. Even the very language 
in which the Old Testament Scriptures were originally 
written had ceased to be spoken before the coming of 
Christ. No stronger evidence of their antiquity could 
be alleged, than what is indisputably true ; and if it were 
to be questioned, every othf r truth of ancient history 
must first be set aside. 

That the prediction war, j rior to the event, many facts 
in the present state of the world abundantly testify ; and 
many prophecies remain even yet to be fulfilled. But 
independently of external testimony, the prophecies 
themselves bear intrinsic marks of their antiquity and 
of their truth. Predictions concerning the same event 
are sometime? delivered by a succession of prophets. 
Sometimes the same prophecy concerning any city or 
nation gradually meets its fulfilment during a long pro- 
tracted period, where the truth of the prediction must 
be unfolded by degrees. They are, in general, so inter- 
woven with the history of the Jews — so casually intro- 
duced in their application to the surrounding nations — 
so frequently concealed in their purport, even from the 
honoured but unconscious organs of their communica- 
tion, and preserving throughout so entire a consistency 
— so different in the modes of their narration, and each 
part preserving its own particular character — so de- 
livered without form or system — so shadowed under 
types and symbols — so complete when compared and 
combined — so apparently unconnected when disjoined — 
and revealed in such a variety of modes and expressions, 
that the very manner of their conveyance forbids the idea 
of artifice ; or if they were false, nothing could admit of 
more easy detection — if true, nothing could be more 
impossible to have been conceived by man. And they 
must either be a number of incoherent and detached 
pretensions to inspiration, that can bear no scrutiny, and 
that have no reference to futurity but what deceivers 
might have devised ; or else, as the only alternative, they 
give such a comprehensive, yet minute representation 
of future events — so various, yet so distinct — so distant, 
yet so true — that none but he who knoweth all things 
could have revealed them to man, and none but those 
who have hardened their hearts and closed their eyes 
can forbear from feeling and from perceiving them to be 



INTRODUCTION. 21 

credentials of the truth, clear as light from heaven. To 
justify their pretensions to their contemporaries, the 
prophets referred, on particular occasions, to some ap- 
proaching circumstance as a proof of their prophetic 
spirit, and as a symbol or representation of a more dis- 
tant and important event. They could thus be distin- 
guished in their own age from false prophets, if their 
predictions were then true, and they ventured to raise, 
from the succeeding ages of the world, that veil which 
no uninspired mortal could touch. They spoke of a 
deliverer of the human race — they described the desola- 
tion of cities and of nations, whose greatness was then 
unshaken, and whose splendour has ever since been un- 
rivalled — and their predictions were of such a character, 
that time would infallibly refute or realize them. 

Religion deserves a candid examination, and it demands 
nothing more. The fulfilment of prophecy forms part 
of the evidence of Christianity. And are the prophecies 
false, or are they true ] Is their fallacy exposed or their 
truth ratified by the event 1 And whether are they thus 
proved to be the delusions of impostors or the dictates 
of inspiration 1 To the 'solution of these questions a 
patient and impartial inquiry alone is requisite : reason 
alone is appealed to, and no other faith is here necessary 
but that which arises as the natural and spontaneous 
fruit of rational conviction. The man who withholds 
this inquiry, and who will not be impartially guided by 
its result, is not only reckless of his fate, but devoid of 
that of which he prides himself the most — even of all 
true liberality of sentiment : he is the bigot of infidelity, 
who will not believe the truth because it is the truth. It 
is incontestable, that in a variety of ways a marvellous 
change has taken place in the religious and political 
state of the world since the prophecies were delivered. 
A system of religion, widely different from any that then 
existed, has emanated from the land of Judea, and has 
spread over the civilized world. Many remarkable cir- 
cumstances attended its origin and its progress. The 
history of the life and character of its Founder, as it 
was written at the time, and acknowledged as authentic 
by those who believed on him, is so completely without 
a parallel, that it has often attracted the admiration and 
excited the astonishment of infidels ; — and one of them 
even asks, if it be possible that the Sacred Personage 
Whose history the Scripture contains should be himself 



22 INTRODUCTION 

a mere man ; and acknowledges that the fiction of such 
a character is more inconceivable than the reality.* He 
possessed no temporal power, — he inculcated every 
virtue, — his life was spotless and perfect as his doctrine, 
— he was put to death as a criminal. His religion was 
rapidly propagated, — his followers were persecuted, but 
their cause prevailed. The purity of his doctrine was 
maintained for a time, but it was afterward corrupted. 
Yet Christianity has effected a great change. Since its 
establishment the worship of heathen deities has ceased; 
—all sacrifices have been abolished, even where human 
victims were immolated before ; and slavery, which pre- 
vailed in every state, is now unknown in every Chris- 
tian country throughout Europe ; — knowledge has been 
increased, and many nations have been civilized. The 
Christian religion has extended over a great part of 
the world, and it is still enlarging its boundary ; and the 
Jews, though it originated among them, yet continue 
to reject it. In regard to the political changes or revolu- 
tions of states since the prophecies concerning them 
were delivered, — Jerusalem was destroyed and laid waste 
by the Romans — the land of Palestine, and the sur- 
rounding countries are now thinly inhabited, and, in 
comparison of their former fertility, have been almost 
converted into deserts — the Jews have been scattered 
among the nations, and remain to this day a dispersed 
and yet a distinct people—Egypt, one of the first and 
most powerful of nations, has long ceased to be a king- 
dom — Nineveh is no more — Babylon is now a ruin — the 
Persian empire succeeded to the Babylonian — the Gre- 
cian empire succeeded to the Persian, and the Roman to 
the Grecian — the old Roman empire has been divided 
into several kingdoms — Rome itself became the seat of 
a government of a different nature from any other that 
ever existed in the world — the doctrine of the gospel 
was transformed into a system of spiritual tyranny and 
of temporal power — the authority of the pope was held 
supreme in Europe for many ages — the Saracens ob- 
tained a sudden and mighty power ; overran great part 
of Asia and of Europe ; and many parts of Christendom 
suffered much from their incursions — the Arabs main- 
tain their warlike character, and retain possession of 
their own land — the Africans are an humble race, and 

* Rousseau's Emilius, vol. ii. p. 215, quoted in Brewster's Testimonies, p. 133* 



PROPHECIES CONCERNING CHRIST* 23 

are still treated as slaves — Colonies liave been spread 
from Europe to Asia, and are enlarging there — the 
Turkish empire attained to great power ; it continued to 
rise for the space of several centuries, but it paused in 
its progress, has since decayed, and now evidently verges 
to its fall. These form some of the most prominent 
and remarkable facts of the history of the world from 
the ages of the prophecies to the present time ; and it 
to each and all of them, from the first to the last, az» 
index is to be found in the prophecies, we may warrant- 
ably conclude that they could only have been revealed 
by the Ruler among the nations, and that they afford 
more than human testimony of the truth of Christianity. 
In the following treatise an attempt is made to give a 
general and concise sketch of such of the prophecies as 
have been distinctly foretold and clearly fulfilled, and 
as may be deemed sufficient to illustrate the truth of 
Christianity. And if one unbeliever be led the first 
step to a full and candid investigation of the truth, — if 
one doubting mind be convinced, — if one Christian be 
confirmed more strongly in his belief, — if one ray of 
the hope of better things to come arise from hence, to 
enliven a single sorrowing heart,— if one atom be added 
to the mass of evidence, the author of this little work 
will neither have lost his reward, nor spent his labour 
in vain. 



CHAPTER II. 

PROPHECIES CONCERNING CHRIST AND THE CHRISTIAN 
RELIGION. 

It is one of the remarkable peculiarities of the Jewish 
religion, that while it claimed superiority over every 
other, and was distinguished from them all, as alone 
inculcating the worship of the only living and true God, 
and while it was perfectly suited to the purpose for 
which it was designed, it acknowledged that it was 
itself only preparatory to a future, a better, and perfect 
revelation, It was, professedly adapted and limited to 
one particular people ; it was confined, in many of its 



24 PROPHECIES OF THE COMING 

institutions, to the land of Judea ; its morality was in- 
complete ; it tolerated some practices that were neither 
virtuous nor pure ; its ritual observances were numerous, 
oppressive, and devoid of any inherent merit ;* and 
being partial, imperfect, and temporary, and full of 
promises of better things to come, for which it was only 
the means of preparing the way, it was evidently in- 
tended to be the presage of another. It was not even 
calculated of itself to fulfil the promise which it records 
as given unto Abraham, that in him all the families of 
the earth should be blessed ; — though its original institu- 
tion was founded upon this promise, and although the 
accomplishment of it was the great end to be promoted 
by the distinction and separation of his descendants from 
All the nations of the earth. But it was subservient to 
this end, though it could not directly accomplish it ; for 
the coming of a Saviour was the great theme of pro- 
phecy, and the universal belief of the Jews. From the 
commencement to the conclusion of the Scriptures of 
the Old Testament, it is predicted or prefigured. They 
represent the first act of divine justice, which was exer- 
cised on the primogenitors of the human race, as mingled 
with divine mercy. Before their seclusion from para- 
dise, a gleam of hope was seen to shine around them, in 
the promise of a suffering but triumphant Deliverer. 
To Abraham the same promise was conveyed in a more 
definite form. Jacob spoke distinctly of the coming of 
a Saviour. Moses, the legislator and leader of the 
Hebrews, prophesied of another lawgiver that God was 
to raise up in a future age.f And while these early and 
general predictions occur in the historical part of Scrip- 
ture, which sufficiently mark the purposed design of the 
Mosaic dispensation, the books that are avowedly pro- 
phetic are clearly descriptive, as a minuter search will 
attest, of the advent of a Saviour, and of every thing 
pertaining to the kingdom he was to establish. Many 
things, apparently contradictory and irreconcilable, are 
foretold as referring to a great Deliverer, whose dignity, 
whose character, and whose office were altogether pecu- 
liar, and in whom the fate of human nature is repre- 

* " Because they had not executed my judgments, but had despised my 
statutes, and had polluted my Sabbaths, and their eyes were after their fathers' 
idols, wherefore I gave them also statutes that were not good, and judgments 
whereby they should not live." Ezek. xx, 24, 25. Acts xv. 10. 

t Deut. xviii. 15, 18. 



OF A SAVIOUR. 25 

sented as involved. Many passages that can bear no 
other application clearly testify of him : Thy King 
cometh — thy salvation cometh — the Redeemer shall 
come to Zion — the Lord cometh — the Messenger of the 
Covenant he shall come — blessed is he that cometh in 
the name of the Lord,* are expressions that occur 
throughout the prophecies. These unequivocally speak 
of the coming of a Saviour. But were every other 
proof wanting, the prophecy of Daniel is sufficient in- 
controvertibly to establish the fact, which we affirm in 
the very words,— that the coming of the Messiah is fore- 
told in the Old Testament. The same fact is confirmed 
by the belief of the Jews in every age. It is so deeply 
and indelibly impressed on their minds, that notwith- 
standing the dispersion of their race throughout the 
world, and the disappointment of their hopes for eighteen 
hundred years after the prescribed period of his coming, 
tke expectation of the Messiah still forms a bond of 
union which no distance can dissolve, and which no 
earthly power can destroy. 

As the Old Testament does contain prophecies of a 
Saviour that was to appear in the world, the only ques- 
tion to be resolved is, whether all that it testifies of him 
be fulfilled in the person of Jesus Christ 1 On a subject 
so interesting, so extensive, and important, which has 
been so amply discussed by many able divines, the reader 
is referred to the works of Barrow, of Pearson, and of 
Clarke. A summary view must be very imperfect and 
incomplete ; but it is here given, as it may serve to 
the general reader to exhibit the connexion between 
the Old and the New Testaments, and as of itself it 
may be deemed conclusive of the argument in favour of 
Christianity. 

A few of the leading features of the prophecies con- 
cerning Christ, and their fulfilment, shall be traced, 
as they mark the time of his appearance — the place of 
his birth — and the family out of which he was to arise 
—his life and character, his miracles, his sufferings, 
and his death — the nature of his doctrine — the design 
and the effect of his coming— and the extent of his 
kingdom. 

The time of the Messiah's appearance in the world, 
as predicted in the Old Testament, is defined by a 

* Zech. ix. 9; Isa. lix. 20; Isa. lxii. 11; Mai. iii. 1; Isa. xxxv. 4; Ps. 

cxvili. 26 ; Dan. ix 25, 26. 

8 B 



26 THE TIME OF THE 

number of concurring circumstances, that fix it to the 
very date of the advent of Christ. The last blessing of 
Jacob to his sons, when he commanded them to gather 
themselves together that he might tell them what should 
befall them in the last days, contains this prediction con- 
cerning Judah; "The sceptre shall not depart from 
Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh 
come ; and unto him shall the gathering of the people 
be."* The date fixed by this prophecy for the coming 
of Shiloh, or the Saviour, was not to exceed the time 
that the descendants of Judah were to continue a 
united people — that a king should reign among them — 
that they should be governed by their own laws, and 
that their judges were to be from among their brethren. 
The prophecy of Malachi adds another standard for 
measuring the time : " Behold I send my messenger, 
and he shall prepare the" way before me, and the Lord, 
whom ye seek, shall come suddenly to his temple, even 
the messenger of the covenant whom ye delight in; 
behold he shall come, saith the Lord of Hosts. "f No 
words can be more expressive of the coming of the 
promised Messiah ; and they as clearly imply his appear- 
ance in the temple before it should be destroyed. But 
it may also be here remarked that Malachi was the last 
of the prophets : with his predictions the vision and the 
prophecy were sealed up, or . the canon of the Old Tes- 
tament was completed. Though many prophets imme- 
diately preceded him, after his time there was no prophet 
in Israel ; but all the Jews, whether of ancient or modern 
times, look for a messenger to prepare the way of the 
Lord immediately before his coming. The long suc- 
cession of prophets had drawn to a close ; and the con- 
cluding words of the Old Testament, subjoined to an 
admonition to remember the law of Moses, import that 
the next prophet would be the harbinger of the Messiah, 
Another criterion of the time is thus imparted. In 
regard to the advent of the Messiah, before the destruc- 
tion of the second temple, the words of Haggai are 
remarkably explicit: "The desire of all nations shall 
come, and I will fill this house with glory, saith the 
Lord of Hosts. The glory of this latter house shall frs 
greater than of the former, and in this place will I giv*> 
peace."} The contrast which the prophet had just 

* Gen. xlix. 10. f Mai. iii. 1. % Hag. ii. ?. . 



BIRTH OF CHRIST. 27 

drawn between the glory of Solomon's temple and that 
which had been erected in its stead, to which he declares 
it was, in comparison, as nothing, — the solemn manner 
of its introduction, " Thus saith the Lord of Hosts, yet 
once it is a little while, and I will shake the heavens and 
the earth ;" the excellency of the latter house excelling 
that of gold and silver ; the expression so characteristic 
of the Messiah, the " desire of all nations ;" and the 
blessing of peace that was to accompany his coming — 
all tend to denote that he alone is spoken of who was 
the hope of Israel, and of whom all the prophets did 
testify, and that his presence would give to that temple 
a greater glory than that of the former. The Saviour 
was thus to appear, according to the prophecies of the 
Old Testament, during the time of the continuance of 
the kingdom of Judah, previous to the demolition of the 
temple, and immediately subsequent to the next prophet. 
But the time is rendered yet more definite. In the pro- 
phecies of Daniel, the kingdom of the Messiah is not 
only foretold as commencing in the time of the fourth 
monarchy or Roman empire, but the express number 
of years that were to precede his coming are plainly 
intimated : " Seventy weeks are determined upon thy 
people, and upon thy holy city, to finish the transgression 
and to make an end of sins, and to make reconciliation 
for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness, 
and to seal up the vision and prophecy, and to anoint 
the Most Holy. Know therefore and understand that 
from the going forth of the commandment to restore 
and to build Jerusalem, unto Messiah the prince, shall be 
seven weeks and threescore and two weeks."* Compu- 
tation by weeks of years was common among the Jews, 
and every seventh was the Sabbatical year; seventy 
weeks thus amounted to four hundred and ninety years. 
In these words the prophet marks the very time and 
uses the very name of Messiah, the prince ; so entirely 
is all ambiguity done away. 

' The plainest inference may be drawn from these pro- 
phecies. All of them, while in every respect they pre- 
suppose the most perfect knowledge of futurity ; while 
they were unquestionably delivered and publicly known 
for ages previous to the time to wmich they referred; 
while^ there is Jewish testimony o ' their application to 

* Dan. ix. 24, 25. 
B2 



28 THE TIME OF THE 

the time of the Messiah,* which was delivered fifty years 
before Christ ; and while they refer to different contin- 
gent and unconnected events utterly undeterminable and 
inconceivable by all human sagacity ; — accord in perfect 
unison to a single precise period where all their different 
lines terminate at once, — the very fulness of time when 
Jesus appeared. A king then reigned over the Jews in 
their own land, they were governed by their own laws, 
and the council of their nation exercised its authority and 
power. Before that period, the other tribes were extinct 
or dispersed among the nations. Judah alone remained, 
and the last sceptre in Israel had not then departed from 
it. Every stone of the temple was then unmoved ; it 
was the admiration of the Romans, and might have stood 
for ages. But in a short space all these concurring tes- 
timonies to the time of the advent of the Messiah passed 
away. During the very year, the twelfth of his age, in 
which Christ first publicly appeared in the temple, Ar- 
chelaus, the king, was dethroned and banished ; Coponius 
was appointed procurator ; and the kingdom of Judea, 
the last remnant of the greatness of Israel, was debased 
into a part of the province of Syria. f The sceptre w T as 
smitten from the hands of the tribe of Judah — the crown 
fell from their heads — their glory departed — and, soon 
after the death of Christ, of their temple one stone was 
not left upon another — their commonwealth itself be- 
came as complete a ruin, and was broken in pieces — and 
they have ever since been scattered throughout the world, 
a name, but not a nation. After the lapse of nearly four 
hundred years posterior to the time of Malachi, another 
prophet appeared who was the herald of the Messiah. 
And the testimony of Josephus confirms the account 
given in Scripture of John the Baptist.^ Every mark 
that denoted the time of the coming of the Messiah was 
erased soon after the crucifixion of Christ, and could 
never afterward be renewed. And with respect to the 
prophecies of Daniel, it is remarkable at this remote pe- 
riod how little discrepancy of opinion has existed among 
the most learned men as to the space from the time of 
the passing out of the edict to rebuild Jerusalem, after 
the Babylonish captivity, to the commencement of the 
Christian era, and the subsequent events foretold in the 
prophecy. Our design precludes detail ; but the minute 
coincidence of the narrative of the New Testament, and 

* R. Nehumias, quoted by Grotius de Verit. j Josioti. Ant 17, c. J 3 

lb. 18, 5. 



BIRTH OF CHRIST* 2£ 

the history of the Jews, with the subdivisions of time 
which it enumerates, are additional attestations of its 
general accuracy as applicable to Christ. This coinci- 
dence is the more striking as it is unnoticed by the re- 
laters of the facts which establish it, and as it has been 
left, without the possibility of any adaptation of the 
events, to the discovery of modern chronologists. The 
following observations of Dr. Samuel Clarke, partly com- 
municated to him, as he acknowledges, by Sir Isaac 
Newton, elucidate this prophecy so clearly that every 
reader will forgive their insertion: — "When the angel 
says to Daniel, Seventy weeks are determined upon th* 
people, <$fc. — was this written after the event ] Or can 
it reasonably be ascribed to chance, that from the seventl: 
year of Artaxerxes the king (when Ezra went up from 
Babylon unto Jerusalem with a commission to restore 
the government of the Jews) to the death of Christ (from 
Ann. Nabon. 290 to Ann. Nabon. 780) should be precisely 
490 (70 weeks of) years. When the angel tells Daniel 
that in threescore and two weeks the street (of Jerusa 
lem) should be built again, and the wall, even in troublous 
times (but this in troublous times not like those that 
should be under Messiah the prince when he should come 
to reign) ; — was this written after the event 1 Or can it 
reasonably be ascribed to chance, that from the 28th 
year of Artaxerxes, when the wails were finished, to the 
birth of Christ (from Ann. Nabon. 311 to 745), should be 
precisely 434 (62 weeks of) years ] When Daniel further 
says, And he shall confirm (or, nevertheless he shall con- 
firm) the covenant with many for one week ; — was this 
written after the event ] Or can it reasonably be ascribed 
to chance, that from the death of Christ {Ann. Bom. 33) 
to the command given first to Peter to preach to Corne- 
lius and the Gentiles (Ann. Bom. 40) should be exactly 
seven (one week of) years ] When he still adds, And in 
the midst of the week (and in half a iveek) he shall cause the 
sacrifice and the oblation to cease, and for the overspreading 
of abominations he shall make it desolate ; — was this written 
after the event 1 Or can it with any reason be ascribed 
to chance, that from Vespasian's march into Judea in the 
spring Ann. Bom. 67, to the taking of Jerusalem by Titus 
in the autumn Ann. Bom. 70, should be half a septenary 
of years, or three years and a half !"* 

«* Clarke's Works, fol. edit. vol. li. p. 721 
3* 



30 PROPHECIES CONCERNING 

That the time at which the promised Messiah was to 
appear is clearly defined in these prophecies ; that the 
expectation of the coming of a great king or deliverer 
was then prevalent, not only among the Jews, but among 
all the eastern nations, in consequence of these prophe- 
cies ; that it afterward excited that people to revolt, and 
proved the cause of their greater destruction ; — the im- 
partial and unsuspected evidence of heathen authors is 
combined with the reluctant and ample testimony of the 
Jews themselves to attest. 

Tacitus, Suetonius, Josephus, and Philo agree in tes- 
tifying the antiquity of the prophecies, and their acknowl- 
edged reference to that period.* Even the Jews to this 
day own that the time when their Messiah ought to have 
appeared, according to their prophecies, is long since 
past ; and they attribute the delay of his coming to the 
sinfulness of their nation. And thus, from the distinct 
prophecies themselves, from the testimony of profane 
historians, and from the concessions of the Jews, every 
requisite proof is afforded that Christ appeared when all 
the concurring circumstances of the time denoted the 
prophesied period of his advent. 

The predictions contained in the Old Testament, re- 
specting both the family out of which the Messiah was 
to arise and the place of his birth, are almost as circum- 
stantial, and are equally applicable to Christ, as those 
which refer to the time of his appearance. He was to 
be an Israelite, of the tribe of Judah, of the family of 
David, and of the town of Bethlehem. The two former 
of these particulars are implied in the promise made to 
Abraham, — in the prediction of Moses, — in the prophetic 
benediction of Jacob to Judah, — and in the reason as- 
signed for the superiority of that tribe, because out of it 
the chief ruler should arise. And the two last, that the 
Messiah was to be a descendant of David and a native 
of Bethlehem are expressly affirmed. There shall come 
forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a branch shall grow 

* Pluribus persuasio inerat, antiquis sacerd.oh.im libris, contineri— eo ipso 
tempore fore — ut valesceret Oriens, profectique Judcea, rerum potirentur. Quae 
ambages Vespatianum et Titum predixerunt. Sed Vulgus (Judaeorum), more 
humanoe cupidinis, sibi tantum fatorum magnitudinem interpretari, ne adver- 
sis, quidem, ad vera mutabantur. — Tacit. Ann. v. 13. Percrebuerat Oriente 
toto constans opinio esse infatis, ut eo tempore Judaea profecti, rerum poti- 
rentur. Id de imperio Romano, quantum postea eventu patuit, praedietum Ju- 
dsei ad se habentes, rebellarunt. — Suet, in Vesp. 1. 8, c. 4. — Julius Marana- 
Ihus, quoted by Suetonius, lib. 2, 93.— Joseph, de Bello, vii. dl.—Fhilo de 
Proem, et Pen. p 923,4 



THE BIRTH OF CHRIST. 31 

out of his roots, and the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon 
him.* That this prophecy refers to the Deliverer of the 
hum an race is evident from the whole of the succeeding 
chapter, which is descriptive of the kingdom of the Mes- 
siah, of the calling of the Gentiles, and of the restoration 
of Israel. The same fact is predicted in many passages 
of the prophecies : — " Thine house and thy kingdom shall 
be established for ever before thee. — I have made a cove- 
nant with my chosen. I have sworn to David my servant, 
thy seed will I establish for ever, and build up thy throne 
to all generations. — Behold the days come, saith the 
Lord, that I will raise unto David a righteous branch, 
and a king shall reign and prosper, and shall execute 
judgment and justice on the earth ; and this is the name 
whereby he shall be called — the Lord our Righteous- 
ness."! The place of the birth of the Messiah is thus 
clearly foretold : — " Thou Bethlehem Ephratah, in the 
land of Judah, though thou be little among the thousands 
of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth," or, as the 
Hebrew word implies.J shall he be born — " that is to be 
ruler in Israel, whose goings forth hath been of old, from 
everlasting. "§ That all these predictions were fulhlled 
in Jesus Christ, — that he was of that country, tribe, and 
family, of the house and lineage of David, and born in 
Bethlehem, — we have the fullest evidence in the testi- 
mony of all the evangelists; in two distinct accounts of 
the genealogies (by natural and legal succession), which, 
according to the custom of the Jews, were carefully pre- 
served ; in the acquiescence of the enemies of Christ to 
the truth of the fact, against which there is not a single 
surmise in history ; and in the appeal made by some of 
the earliest of the Christian writers to the unquestio li- 
able testimony of the records of the census, taken at the 
very time of our Saviour's birth by order of Caesar. || 
Here, indeed, it is impossible not to be struck with the 
exact fulfilment of prophecies which are apparently con- 
tradictory and irreconcilable, and with the manner in 
which they were providentially accomplished. The spot 
of Christ's nativity was distant from the place of the 
abode of his parents, and the region in which he began 
his ministry was remote from the place of his birth ; and 
another prophecy respecting him was in this manner veri- 

* Isaiah, xi. 1. 1 2 Sam. vii. 18. Ps. Ixxxix. 3, 4. Jer. xxiii. 5. 

% Gen. x. 14 ; xv. 4 ; xvii. 6. 2 Sam. vii. 12, &c. § Mic. V. 2. 

U Justin. Mar. ap. i. p. 55, ed. Thirl. Tert. in Mark i v , 19. 



32 THE LIFE AND 

fied . " In the land of Zebulun and Naphtali, by the way 
of the sea beyond Jordan, in Galilee of the nations, the 
people that walked in darkness have seen a great light , 
they that dwell in ttoe land of the shadow of death, upon 
them hath the light shined."* Thus, the time at which 
the predicted Messiah was to appear; the nation, the 
tribe, and the family from which he was to be descended , 
and the place of his birth — no populous city, but of itself 
an inconsiderable place — were all clearly foretold ; and 
as clearly refer to Jesus Christ : and all meet their com 
pletion in him. 

But the facts of his life and the features of his charac- 
ter are also drawn with a precision that cannot be mis- 
understood. The obscurity, the meanness, and poverty 
of his external condition are thus represented : — " He 
shall grow up before the Lord like a tender plant, and as 
a root out of a dry ground : he hath no form or come- 
liness : and when we shall see him, there is no beauty 
that we should desire him. — Thus saith the Lord, to him 
whom man despiseth, to him whom the nation abhor- 
reth, to a servant of rulers, kings shall see and arise, 
princes also shall worship."! That such was the con- 
dition in which Christ appeared, the whole history of his 
*ife abundantly testifies. And the Jews, looking in the 
pride of their hearts for an earthly king, disregarded these 
prophecies concerning him, were deceived by their tra- 
ditions, and found only a stone of stumbling, where, if 
they had searched their Scriptures aright, they would 
have discovered an evidence of the Messiah. " Is not 
this the carpenter's son ] is not this the son of Mary 1 
said they, and they were offended at him." His riding 
in humble triumph into Jerusalem ; his being betrayed 
for thirty pieces of silver, and scourged, and buffeted, and 
spit upon; the piercing of his hands and of his feet ; the 
last offered draught of vinegar and gall ; the parting of 
his raiment, and casting lots upon his vesture ; the man- 
ner of his death and of his burial, and his rising again 
without seeing corruption,! — were all expressly pre 
dieted, and all these predictions were literally fulfilled 
If all these prophecies admit of any application to the 
events of the life of any individual, it can only be to thai 
of the author of Christianity. And what other religion 

* Isaiah ix. 1, 2. Matt. iv. 16. j Isaiah liii. 2; xlix. 7. 

t Zech. ix. 9; xi. 12. Isa. 1. 6. Ps. xxii. J6; lxix. 21 ; xxii. 18; Isa. liii 
9 ; Ps xvi. 10. 



t 



CHARACTER OF CHRIST- 33 

can produce a single fact which, was actually foretold of 
its founder ? 

Though the personal appearance or mortal condition 
of the Messiah was represented by the Jewish prophets 
such as to bespeak no grandeur, his personal character is 
described as of a higher order than that of the sons of 
men. " Righteousness shall be the girdle of his loins, 
and faithfulness the girdle of his reins. He hath done 
no violence, neither was there any deceit in his lips. 
The spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the spirit of 
wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and 
might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the 
Lord. The Lord God hath given me the tongue of the 
learned, that I should know how to speak a word in sea- 
son to him that is weary. He shall feed his flock like a 
shepherd ; he shall gather the lambs with his arm, and 
carry them in his bosom. A bruised reed shall he not 
break, and the smoking flax shall he not quench. Behold, 
thy king cometh unto thee : he is just and having salva- 
tion ; lowly and riding upon an ass. He shall not cry, 
nor lift up, nor cause his voice to be heard in the street. 
He was oppressed and afflicted, yet he opened not his 
mouth ; he was brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and 
as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he opened not 
his mouth. I gave my back to the smiters, and my 
cheek to them that plucked off the hair : I did not hide 
my face from shame and spitting. The Lord God hath 
opened mine ear that I was not rebellious, neither turned 
away back. The Lord will help me, therefore shall I not 
be confounded ; therefore have I set my face like a flint, 
and I know that I shall not be ashamed."* How many 
virtues are thus represented in the prophecies as charac- 
teristic of the Messiah ; and how applicable are they all 
to Christ alone, and how clearly imbodied in his charac- 
ter ! His wisdom and knowledge — his speaking as never 
man spake- — the general meekness of his manner and mild- 
ness of his conversation — his perfect candour and un- 
sullied purity — his righteousness — his kindness and com- 
passion — his genuine humility — his peaceable disposition 
— his unrepining patience — his invincible courage — his 
more than heroic resolution, and more than human for- 
bearance — his unfaltering trust in God, and complete 
resignation to his will, — are all portrayed in the liveliest 

* lea. xi. 2, $; xl. 11 ; 1. 4, 6, 7; xlii. 2, 3 ; liij 7, 3, 11. Zech. ix T3 
B3 






34 THE CHARACTER AND 

the most affecting and expressive terms ; and among all 
who ever breathed the breath of life, they can be applied 
to Christ alone.* 

Mahomet pretended to receive a divine warrant to 
sanction his past impurities and to license his future 
crimes. How different is the appeal of Jesus to earth and 
to heaven : " If I do not the works of my Father, believe 
me not. — Search the Scriptures, for these are they which 
testify of me." They did testify of the coming of a 
Messiah, and of the superhuman excellence of his moral 
character. And if the life of Jesus was wonderful and 
unparalleled of itself, how miraculous does it appear, 
when all his actions develop the prophetic character of 
the promised Saviour ! The internal and external evi- 
dence are here combined at once ; and while the life of 
Christ proved that he was a righteous person, it proved 
also, as testified of by the prophets, that he was the Son 
of God. 

In describing the blessings of the reign of the Messiah, 
the prophet Isaiah foretold the greatness and the benig- 
nity of his miracles: — "The eyes of the blind shall 
be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped ; 
the lame man shall leap as an hart, and the tongue of the 
dumb shall sing."f The history of Jesus shows how 
such acts of mercy formed the frequent exercise of his 
power : at his word, the blind received their sight, the 
lame walked, the deaf heard, and the dumb spake. J 

The death of Christ was as unparalleled as his life ; 
and the prophecies are as minutely descriptive of his suf- 
ferings as of his virtues. Not only did the paschal lamb, 
which was to be killed every year in all the families of 
Israel — which was to be taken out of the flock, to be 
without blemish — to be eaten with bitter herbs — to have 
its blood sprinkled, and to be kept whole that not a bone 
of it should be broken; not only did the offering up of 
Isaac, and the lifting up of the brazen serpent in the wil- 
derness, by looking upon which the people were healed, 
— and many ritua observances of the Jews, — prefigure 
the manner of Christ's death, and the sacrifice which 
was to be made for sin : — but many express declarations 
abound in the prophecies that Christ was indeed to suffer. 
Exclusive of the repeated declarations^ in the Psalms 

* See Barrow on the Creed, p. 190. f Isa. xxxv. 5. I Matt. xi. 5. 

§ Ps. ii. ; xxii. 1, 6, 7, 16, 18 ; xxxv. 7, 11 12 ; !xix. 20, 21 ; cix. 2, 3, 5, 25 ; 
xviii. 22. 



MIRACLE3 OF CHRIST. 35 

of afflictions which apply literally to him, and are inter- 
woven with allusions to the Messiah's kingdom, the 
prophet Daniel,* in limiting the time of his coming, 
directly affirms that the Messiah was to be cut off; and 
in the same manifest allusion Zechariah uses these em- 
phatic words : " Awake, O sword, against my Shepherd, 
and against the man that is my fellow, saith the Lord of 
Hosts : smite the shepherd, and the sheep shall be scat- 
tered. — I will pour upon the house of David, and upon the 
inhabitants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and of sup- 
plications ; and they shall look upon me whom they 
have pierced, and they shall mourn for him."f 

But Isaiah, who describes with eloquence worthy of 
a prophet the glories of the kingdom that was to come, 
characterizes, with the accuracy of an historian, the hu- 
miliation, the trials, and the agonies which were to pre 
cede the triumphs of the Redeemer of a world; and 
the history of Christ forms, to the very letter, the com- 
mentary and the completion of his every prediction. 
In a single passage,{ — the connexion of which is unin- 
terrupted, its antiquity indisputable, and its application 
obvious, — the sufferings of the servant of God (who, 
under the same denomination, is previously described as 
he who was to be the light of the Gentiles, the Salva- 
tion of God to the ends of the earth, and the Elect of 
God in whom his soul delighted) § are so minutely fore- 
told that no illustration is requisite to show that they 
testify of Jesus. Of the multitude of parallel passages 
in the New Testament, a few shall be selected and sub- 
joined to the prophecy. 

"He is despised and rejected of men; He came unto 
his own, and his own received him not; He had not 
where to lay his head; they derided him. — A man of 
sorrows and acquainted with grief; Jesus wept at the 
grave of Lazarus ; He mourned over Jerusalem ; He 
felt the ingratitude and the cruelty of men ; He bore the 
contradiction of sinners against himself — and these are 
expressions of sorrow which were peculiarly his own : 
4 Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me : but 
for this end came I into the world. — My God ! my God ! 
why hast thou forsaken me V We hid, as it were, our 
faces from him ; he ivas despised, and we esteemed him not* 

* Dan. ix. 26. T Zech. xiii. 7 ; xii. 10L 

4. Tsa. lii. 13 &c. and chap. liii. £ Isa. xlii. 10; xlix. 6. 



36 THE MANNER OF 

— All his disciples forsook him and fled. Not this man, 
but Barabbas ; now Bar abbas was a robber. The 
soldiers mocked him, and bowed the knee before him in 
derision." The catalogue of his sufferings is continued 
in the words of the prophecy — " We did esteem him 
stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted; He was wounded, 
he was oppressed, he ivas afflicted; He was brought as a lamb 
to the slaughter; He ivas taken away by distress and by 
judgment" And to this general description is united 
the detail of minuter incidents, which fixes the fact of 
their application to Jesus — " He ivas cut off out of the 
land of the living ; He was crucified in the flower of his 
age. They (the people) made his grave with the wicked, 
but he was with the rich after his death ; Joseph of Arima- 
thea, a rich man, went and begged the body of Jesus, 
and laid it in his own new tomb. He was numbered with 
the transgressors ; He was crucified between two thieves. 
His visage was so marred, more than any man's, and his 
form more than the sons of men" — without any direct 
allusion made to it, but in literal fulfilment of the pro- 
phecy — the bloody sweat, the traces of the crown of 
thorns, his having been spit on, and smitten on the head, 
disfigured the face ; while the scourge, the nails in his 
hands and in his feet, and the spear that pierced his side, 
marred the form of Jesus more than that of the sons 
of men. 

That this circumstantial and continuous description 
of the Messiah's sufferings might not admit of any 
ambiguity, — the dignity of his person — the incredulity 
of the Jews — the innocence of the sufferer — the cause 
of his sufferings — and his consequent exaltation — are 
all particularly marked, and are equally applicable to the 
doctrine of the gospel. "He shall be exalted and extolled, 
and be very high ; Who kdcth believed our report, and to 
whom is the arm of the Lord revealed 1 For he shall grow 
up as a tender plant," &c. The mean external condition 
of Christ is here assigned as the reason of the unbelief 
of the Jews, and it was the very reason which they 
themselves assigned. The prediction points out the 
procuring cause of his sufferings — "He hath borne our 
griefs, he hath carried our sorrows. Christ was once of- 
fered to bear the sins of many. He was wounded for our 
transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities, the chas- 
tisement of our peace was upon him, and with his stripes ive 
are healed. His own self bare our sins in Ins body on 



Christ's death. 37 

the tree, that we, being dead unto sin, should live unto 
righteousness ; by whose stripes we are healed. All we 
like sheep have gone astray, and have turned every one to 
his own way, and the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of 
us all: All flesh have sinned; ye were as sheep going 
astray, but ye are now returned unto the Shepherd and 
Bishop of your souls. He had done no violence, neither 
was there any deceit in his mouth ; Thou shalt make his 
soul an offering for sin ; God made him to be sin foi us 
who knew no sin." 

The whole of this prophecy thus refers to the Mes- 
siah. It describes both his debasement and his dignity 
— his rejection by the Jews — his humility, his affliction, 
and his agony — his magnanimity and his charity — how 
his words were disbelieved — how his state was lowly- 
how his sorrow was severe— how he opened not his 
mouth but to make intercession for the transgressors. 
In diametrical opposition to eveiy dispensation of Provi- 
dence which is registered in the records of the Jews, it 
represents spotless innocence suffering by the appoint- 
ment of Heaven, — death as the issue of perfect obedience 
— his righteous servant as forsaken of God, — and one 
who was perfectly immaculate bearing the chastisement 
of many guilty, sprinkling many nations from their 
iniquity by virtue of this sacrifice, justifying many by 
his knowledge, and dividing a portion with the great and 
the spoil with the strong, because he hath poured out 
his soul in death. This prophecy, therefore, simply as 
a prediction prior to the event, renders the very unbelief 
of the Jews an evidence against them, converts the 
scandal of the cross into an argument in favour of 
Christianity, and presents us with an epitome of the 
truth — a miniature of the gospel in some of its most 
striking features. The simple exposition of it sufficed 
at once for the conversion of the eunuch of Ethiopia ; 
and, without the aid of an apostle, it can boast, in more 
modern times, of a nobler trophy of its truth — in a vic- 
tory which it was mainly instrumental in obtaining and 
securing over the strongly-riveted prejudices and long- 
tried infidelity of a man of genius and of rank, who was 
one of the most abandoned, insidious, and successful ot 
the advocates of impurity, and of the enemies of the 
Christian faith.* 

* Burnet's Life of the Earl of Rochester, p. *0, 71. 
4 



38 NATURE OF THE 

Thus it is written, and thus it behooved Christ to suffer 
according to the Scriptures, and thus the apostle testifies ; 
— those things which God had showed by the mouth of 
all the prophets, that Christ should suffer, he hath so 
fulfilled. 

That the Jews still retain these prophecies, and are 
the means of preserving them, and communicating them 
throughout the world, while they bear so strongly against 
themselves, and testify so clearly of a Saviour that was 
first to suffer and then to be exalted, — are facts as indu- 
bitable as they are unaccountable, and give a confirma- 
tion to the truth of Christianity, than which it is difficult 
to conceive any stronger. The prophecies, as we have 
seen, by a simple enumeration of a few of them that 
testify of the sufferings of the Messiah, need no forced 
interpretation, but apply in the plainest, simplest, and 
most literal manner, to the history of the sufferings and 
of the death of Christ. In the testimony of the Jews 
to the existence of these prophecies long prior to the 
Christian era ; in their remaining unaltered to this hour ; 
in the accounts given by the evangelists of the life and 
death of Christ ; in the testimony of heathen authors ;* 
and in the arguments of the first opposers of Christianity, 
from the mean condition of its author, and the manner 
of his death; — we have now greater evidence of the 
fulfilment of all these prophecies, than could have been 
conceived possible at so great a distance of time. 

But the prophecies further present us with the character 
of the gospel as well as of its Author, and with a de- 
scription of the extent of his kingdom as well as of his 
sufferings. It was prophesied that the Messiah was to 
reveal the will of God to man, and~'establish a new and 
perfect religion : — " I will raise them up a prophet, and I 
will put my words in his mouth, and he shall speak unto 
them all that I shall command him ; and it shall come to 
pass, that whosoever will not hearken unto my words 
which he shall speak in my name, I will require it of 
him. — Unto us a child is born, unto us a Son is given, 
and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his 
name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, the Mighty 
God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace. Of 
the increase of his government and peace there shall be 
no end ; upon the throne of David, and upon his kingdom 

* A let or nominis ejus Christus, Tiberio imperitante, per procuratorem 
Pontium Pilalum supplieio adfectus erat. — Tacit. An. xv. 44. 



CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 39 

to order it, and to establish it with judgment and justice 
from henceforth, even for ever. The zeal of the Lord 
of Hosts will perform this. — There shall come forth a 
rod out of the stem of Jesse ; he shall not judge after 
the sight of his eyes, neither reprove after the hearing 
of his ears ; with righteousness shall he judge the poor, 
and reprove with equity. — I, the Lord, have called thee 
in righteousness, and will hold thine hand, and will keep 
thee, and give thee for a covenant of the people, for a 
light of the Gentiles to open the blind eyes. — Incline 
your ear and come unto me, hear and your soul shall 
live ; and I will make an everlasting covenant with you, 
even the sure mercies of David. Behold, I have given 
him for a witness to the people, for a leader and a com- 
mander to the people. I will set up one shepherd over 
them, and he shall feed them ; and I will make with them 
a covenant of peace, and it shall be an everlasting cove- 
nant, and I will set my sanctuary in the midst of them ; 
one king shall be king to them all, neither shall they 
defile themselves any more with idols. They shall have 
one shepherd. They shall also walk in my judgments, 
and my servant David shall be their prince for ever. 
Behold the days come, saith the Lord, that I will make 
a new covenant, and this shall be the covenant that I 
will make with the house of Israel, after these days : 
I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in 
their hearts, and will be their God, and they shall be my 
people ; and they shall teach no more every man his 
neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the 
Lord ; for they all shall know me, from the least of them 
unto the greatest of them, saith the Lord, for I will for- 
give their iniquity and remember their sins no more."* 
A future and perfect revelation of the divine will is thus 
explicitly foretold. That these promised blessings were 
to extend beyond the confines of Judea is expressly and 
frequently predicted : — " It is a light thing that thou 
shouldst be my servant, to raise up the tribes of Jacob, 
and to restore the preserved of Israel. I will also give 
thee for a light to the Gentiles, that thou mayst be my 
salvation unto the end of the earth."f 

While many of the prophecies which are descriptive 
of the glories of the reign of the Messiah refer to its 

* Den. xviii. 18, 10. Isa. ix. 6, 7; xlii. 6; xi 1, 6; h 3, 4. Ezek. xxxir 
23, 25; xxxvii. 26. Jer. xxxu 31, 23, 34. 
t Isa. xlix. 6 ; lvi. 0, &c. 



40 NATURE OF THE 

universal extension, and to the final restoration of the 
Jews, they detail and define, at the same time, the nature 
and the blessings of the gospel ; and no better description 
or definition could now be given of the doctrine of Christ, 
and of the conditions which he hath proposed for the 
acceptance of man, than those very prophecies which 
were delivered many hundreds of years before he ap- 
peared in the woild. The gospel, as the name itself 
signifies, denotes glad tidings. Christ himself invited 
those who were weary and heavy laden to come unto 
him that they might find rest unto their souls. He was 
the messenger of peace. He came, as he professed, to 
offer a sacrifice for the sins of the world, and to reveal 
the will of God to man. He published the terms of our 
acceptance. His word is still that of reconciliation, his 
law that of love ; and all the duty he has prescribed tends 
to qualify man for spiritual and eternal felicity, for this 
is the sum and the object of it all. What more could 
have been given, and what less could have been required? 
In similar terms do the prophecies of old describe the 
new law that was to be revealed, and the advent of the 
Saviour that was to come : — " Rejoice greatly, O daughter 
of Zion ; shout, O daughter of Jerusalem ; behold thy 
king cometh unto thee. How beautiful upon the moun- 
tains are the feet of him that bringeth good tidings of 
good, that publisheth salvation. The Spirit of the Lord 
God is upon me, because the Lord hath anointed me to 
preach good tidings unto the meek ; he hath sent me to 
bind up the broken-hearted, to proclaim liberty to the 
captives, to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord." 
Having read these words out of the lav/, in the syna- 
gogue, Jesus said, " this day is the Scripture fulfilled." 
He was a teacher of righteousness and of peace, and in him 
alone it could have been fulfilled. The same character 
of joy, indicative of the kingdom of the Messiah, is also 
given by different prophets. He was to " finish trans- 
gression, to make an end of sins, and to make reconcilia- 
tion for iniquity ; to sprinkle clean water upon the people 
of God, to sprinkle many nations, to save I hem from 
their uncleanness, and to open a fountain for sin and for 
uncleanness. Let the wicked forsake his ways, and the 
unrighteous man his thoughts, and let him return unto 
the Lord and he will have mercy upon him. I will for 
give their iniquity and remember their sins no more 
The Messiah was to be anointed to comfort all that mourn 



CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 41 

to appoint unto them that mourn in Zion, to give unto 
them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, and 
the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness."* And 
in the gospel of peace these promised blessings are 
realized. We now see what many prophets and wise 
men did desire in vain to see. The Christian religion 
has indeed been sadly perverted and corrupted, and its 
corruptions are the subjects of prophecy. Bigotry has 
often tarnished and obscured ail its benignity. Its lovely 
form has been shrouded in a mask of superstition, of 
tyranny, and of murder. But the religion of Jesus, pure 
from the lips of its Author and the pen of his apostles, 
is calculated to diffuse universal happiness — tends effec- 
tually to promote the moral culture and the civilization 
of humanity — ameliorates the condition and perfects the 
nature of man. It is a doctrine of righteousness, a per- 
fect rule of duty ; it abolishes idolatry, and teaches all 
to worship God only ; it is full of promises to all who 
obey it; it reveals the method of reconciliation for 
iniquity, and imparts the means to obtain it ; it is good 
tidings to the meek ; it binds up the broken-hearted, and 
presents to us the oil of joy for mourning, and the gar- 
ment of praise for the spirit of heaviness, or the most 
perfect system of consolation, under all the evils of life, 
that can be conceived by man. For the confirmation of 
all these prophecies concerning it we stand not in need 
of Jewish testimony, or that of the primitive Christians, 
or of any testimony whatever. It is a matter of expe- 
rience and of fact. The doctrine of the gospel is in 
complete accordance with the predictions respecting it. 
When we compare it with any impure, degrading, vicious, 
and cruel system of religion that existed in the world 
when these prophecies were delivered, its superiority 
must be apparent, and its unrivalled excellence must be 
acknowledged. Deities were then worshipped whose 
vices disgraced human nature ; and even impiety could 
not institute a comparison between them and the God of 
Christians. Idolatry was universally prevalent, and men 
knew not a higher honour than the humiliation of bowing 
down in adoration to stocks and stones, and sometimes 
even to the beasts. Sacrifices were every where offered 
up, and human victims often bled, when the doctrine of 
reconciliation for iniquity was unknown. And we have 

* Isa. lii. 7; lxi. 1 ; xlii. 1, 3. Jer. xxxi 34. Dan. ix 24. 

4* 



) 



42 PROPAGATION AND EXTENT 

only to look beyond the boundaries of Christianity, — to 
Ashantee, or to India, or to China, — to behold the most 
revolting of spectacles in the religious rites and practices 
of man. Regarding the superiority of the Christian 
religion only as a subject of prophecy, the assent can 
hardly be withheld, that the prophecies concerning its 
excellence, and the blessings which it imparts, have been 
amply verified by the peace-speaking gospel of Jesus. 

But, in ascertaining the accomplishment of ancient pre- 
dictions, in evidence of the truth, the unbeliever is not 
solicited to relinquish one iota of his skepticism in any 
matter that can possibly admit of a reasonable doubt. 
For there are many prophecies of the truth of which 
every Christian is a witness, and to the fulfilment of 
which the testimony even of infidels must be borne. 
That the gospel emanated from Jerusalem — that it was 
rejected by a great proportion of the Jews — that it was 
opposed at first by human power — that idolatry has been 
overthrown before it — that kings have become subject to 
it and supported it — that it has already continued for 
many ages — and that it has been propagated throughout 
many countries, are facts clearly foretold and literally 
fulfilled : — " Out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the 
word of the Lord from Jerusalem, and he shall judge 
among the nations.* He shall be for a sanctuary, but 
for a stone of stumbling, and for a rock of offence to 
both the houses of Israel ; for a gin and for a snare to 
the inhabitants of Jerusalem.f The kings of the earth 
set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together 
against the Lord, and against his anointed." In like 
manner Christ frequently foretold the persecution that 
awaited his followers, and the final success of the gospel, 
in defiance of all opposition/! " ^ ne Lord alone shall 
be exalted in that day, and the idols he shall utterly 
abolish ; — from all your idols I will cleanse you ; — I will 
cut off the name of idols out of the land, and they shall 
no more be remembered. § — To a servant of rulers, kings 
shall see and arise, princes also shall worship. The Gen- 
tiles shall come to thy light, and kings to the brightness 
of thy rising. Kings shall be thy nursing fathers, and 
their queens thy nursing mothers. || The Gentiles shall 

* Isa. ii. 3, 4. Micali iv. 2. f Isa. viii.. 14 

t Ps. ii. 2. Mat. x. 17; xvi. 18; xxiv. 14; xxviii. 19L 
§ Isa. ii. 17. Ezek. xxxvi. 25. Zech. xiii. 2. 
' (J Isa xlix. 7—23 ; lii. 15 ; lx. 3. 



OF CHRISTIANITY. 43 

see thy righteousness ; — a people that knew me not shall 
be called after my name. In that day there shall be a 
root of Jesse, which shall stand for an ensign to the 
people ; to it shall the Gentiles seek. I will make an 
everlasting covenant with you. Behold thou shalt call a 
nation that thou knowest not, and nations that knew not 
thee shall run after thee."* 

At the time the prophecies were delivered, there was 
not a vestige in the world of that spiritual kingdom and 
pure religion which they unequivocally represent as 
extending in succeeding ages, not only throughout the 
narrow bounds of the land of Judea, and those countries 
which alone the prophets knew, but over the Gentile 
nations also, even to the uttermost ends of the earth. 
None are now ignorant of the facts, that a system of 
religion which inculcates piety, and purity, and love, — 
which releases man from every burthensome rite, and 
every barbarous institution, and proffers the greatest of 
blessings, — arose from the land of Judea, from among a 
people who are the most selfish and worldly-minded of 
any nation upon earth ; — that, though persecuted at first, 
and rejected by the Jews, it has spread throughout many 
nationsj and extended to those who were far distant from 
the scene of its origin ; and that it freely invites all to 
partake of its privileges, and makes no distinction be- 
tween Barbarian, Scythian, bond or free. A Latin poet, 
who lived at the commencement of the Christian era, 
speaks of the barbarous Britons as almost divided from 
the whole world ; and yet, although far more distant from 
the land of Judea than from Rome, the law which hath 
come out from Jerusalem, hath taken, by its influence, 
the name of barbarous from Britain ; and in our " distant 
isle of the Gentiles," are the prophecies fulfilled, that the 
kingdom of the Messiah, or knowledge of the gospel, 
would extend to the uttermost part of the earth. And, 
in the present day, we can look from one distant isle of 
the Gentiles to another, — from the northern to the south- 
ern ocean, or from one extremity of the globe to another, 
— and behold the extinction of idolatry, and the abolition 
of every barbarous and cruel rite, by the humanizing 
influence of the gospel. But it was at a time when no 
divine light dawned upon the world, save obscurely on 
the land of Judea alone; when all the surrounding 

*Isa. xi. 10; lv. 5. 



44 PROPAGATION AND EXTENT 

nations, in respect to religious knowledge, were involved 
in thick darkness, gross superstition, and blind idolatry • 
when men made unto themselves gods of corruptible 
things; when those mortals were deified, after theii 
death, who had been subject to the greatest vices, and 
who had been the oppressors of their fellow-men ; whei] 
the most shocking rites were practised as acts of reli- 
gion ; when the most enlightened among the nations ol 
the earth erected an altar to the " unknown god," and 
set no limit to the number of their deities ; when one 
of the greatest of the heathen philosophers, and the best 
of their moralists, despairing of the clear discovery of the 
truth by human means, could merely express a wish for 
a divine revelation, as the only safe and certain guide ;* 
when slaves were far more numerous than freemen even 
where liberty prevailed the most ; and w T hen there was 
no earthly hope of redemption from temporal bondage 
or spiritual slavery : — even at such a time the voice of 
prophecy was uplifted in the land of Judea, and it spoke 
of a brighter day that was to .dawn upon the world. It 
was indeed a light shining in a dark place. And from 
whence could that light have emanated but from heaven ? 
A Messiah was promised — a prince of peace was to ap- 
pear — a stone was to be cut without hands that should 
break in pieces and consume all other kingdoms. And 
the spiritual reign of a Saviour is foretold in terms that 
define its duration and extent, as well as describe its 
nature : — " I behold him, but not now — I see him, but not 
nigh. — His name shall endure for ever, his name shall 
be continued as long as the sun, and men shall be blessed 
in him, all nations shall call him blessed. He shall have 
dominion from sea to sea, and from the river unto the ends 
of the earth. — Ask of me, and I shall give thee the hea- 
then for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the 
earth for thy possession. — All the ends of the earth shall 
remember and turn unto the Lord — and all kindreds of 
the nations shall worship before thee.f — I will give thee 
for a light of the Gentiles, that thou mayst be my sal- 
vation to the ends of the earth. — The glory of the Lord 
shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together ; for 
the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it. J — The Lord hath 
made bare his holy arm in the eyes of all the nations 
He shall not fail nor be discouraged till he have set judg • 

* Plato in Phaedone et in Alcibiade, II. 

t Ps. lxxii. 8, 17; ii sT J xxii. 27, 28. J Isa. xl. 5. 



OF CHRISTIANITY. 45 

ment in the earth ; and the isles shall wait for his law.* 
— He will destroy the face of the covering cast over all 
people, and the veil that is spread over all nations. f — I 
am sought of them that asked not for me, — I am found 
of them that sought me not, — I said, Behold me, behold 
me, unto a nation that was not called by my name.J — It 
shall come to pass, in the last days, say both Isaiah and 
Micah in the same words, that the mountain of the Lord's 
house shall be established on the top of the mountains, 
and shall be exalted above the hills — and all nations shall 
flow unto it.§ — In the "place where it was said, Ye are 
not my people, it shall be said, Ye are the sons of the 
Living God. |] — The abundance of the sea shall be con- 
verted unto Thee — the forces of the Gentiles shall come 
unto Thee.^[ — Sing, O barren, thou didst not bear — break 
forth into singing and cry aloud — for more are the chil- 
dren of the desolate than the children of the married wife 
(more Gentiles than Jews).** — Enlarge the place of thy 
tent, and let them stretch forth the curtains of thine 
habitations, — spare not, lengthen thy cords, for thou shalt 
break forth on the right-hand and on the left— and thy 
seed shall inherit the Gentiles — for thy Maker is thy 
husband — the Lord of Hosts is his name — the Lord of 
the whole earth shall he be called — the wilderness and 
the solitary place shall be glad, the desert shall rejoice 
and blossom as the rose."ff 

These prophecies all refer to the extent of the Mes- 
siah's kingdom ; and clear and copious though they be, 
they form but a small number of the predictions of the 
same auspicious import ; — and we have not merely to 
consider what part of them may yet remain to be ful- 
filled, but how much has already been accomplished of 
which no surmise could have been formed, and of which 
all the wisdom of shortsighted mortals could not have 
warranted a thought. All of them were delivered many 
ages before the existence of that religion whose progress 
they minutely describe ; and, when we compare the pres- 
ent state of any country where the gospel is professed 
in its purity, with its state at that period when the Sun 
of righteousness began to arise upon it, we see light per- 
vading the region of darkness, and ignorance and bar- 
barism yielding to knowledge and moral cultivation. Jn 



* Isa. lii. 10 ; xlii. 4. 


f Isa. xxv. 7. 


t Isa. lxv. 1 


§ Isa. ii. 2. Micah iv. 1. 
** Isa. liv. 1, 2, 4, 5. 


|| Hos. i. 10. 


IT Isa. lx. 5. 


tt Isa. xxxv. 1. 





46 PROPAGATION AND EXTENT 

opposition to allhumap probability, and to human wisdom 
and power, the gospel of Jesus, propagated at first by a 
few fishermen of Galilee, has razed every heathen tem- 
ple from its foundation — has overthrown before it every 
impure altar — has displaced from every palace and every 
cottage which it has reached the worship of every false 
god: — the whole civilized world acknowledges its au- 
thority — it has prevailed from the first to the last in de- 
fiance of persecution — -of opposition the most powerful 
and violent — of the direct attacks of avowed, and the 
insidious designs of disguised enemies : — and combating, 
as it ever has been combating, with all the evil passions 
of men that impel them to resist or to pervert it, the lapse 
of eighteen centuries confirms every ancient prediction 
and verifies, to this hour, the declaration of its Author— 
" the gates of hell shall not prevail against it." How is 
it possible that it could have been conceived that such a 
religion would have been characterized in all its parts — 
would have been instituted — opposed — established — pro- 
pagated throughout the world — embraced by so many 
nations — protected at last by princes and kings — and 
received as the rule of faith and the will of God 1 How 
could all these things, and many more respecting it, have 
been foretold, as they unquestionably were many cen- 
turies before the Author of Christianity appeared, if these 
prophecies be not an attestation from on high that every 
prediction and its completion is the work of God and not 
of man? What uninspired mortal could have described 
the nature, the effect, and the progress of the Christian 
religion, when none could have entertained an idea of its 
existence ? For paganism consisted in external rites and 
cruel sacrifices, and in pretended mysteries. Its tolera- 
tion, indeed, has been commended, and not undeservedly : 
for in religion it tolerated whatever was absurd and 
impious, in morals it tolerated all that was impure and 
almost all that was vicious. But the Jewish prophets, 
when the world was in darkness, and could supply no 
light to lead them to such knowledge, predicted the rise 
of a religion which could boast of no such toleration, but 
which was to reveal the will and inculcate the worship 
of the one living and true God — which was to consist in 
moral obedience — to enjoin reformation of life and purity 
of heart — to abolish all sacrifice by revealing a better 
mean of reconciliation for iniquity — to be understood by 
all from the simplicity of its precepts— -and to tolerate no 



OF CHRISTIANITY. 47 

manner of evil, a religion in every respect the reverse of 
paganism, and of which they could not have been fur- 
nished with any semblance upon earth. They saw 
nothing among the surrounding nations but the worship 
of a multiplicity of deities and of idols : if they had 
traversed the whole world they v^ouid have witnessed 
only the same spiritual degradation, and yet they pre- 
dicted the final abolition and extinction both of polytheism 
and of idolatry. The Jewish dispensation was local, 
and Jews prophesied of a religion beginning from Jeru- 
salem, which was to extend to the uttermost parts of the 
earth. So utterly unlikely and incredible were the pro- 
phecies either to have been foretold by human wisdom, 
or to have been fulfilled by human power; and when 
both these wonders are united, they convey an assurance 
of the truth. As a matter of history, the progress of 
Christianity is at least astonishing ; as the fulfilment of 
many prophecies, it is evidently miraculous.* 

The prophesied success and extension of the gospel is 
not less obvious in the New Testament than in the Old. 
A single instance may suffice : — " I saw another angel 
fly in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel 
to preach unto them that dwell on the earth, and to every 
nation, and kindred, and tongue, and people." These 
are the words of a banished man, secluded in a small 
island from which he could not remove, — a believer in a 
new religion every where spoken against and persecuted. 
They were uttered at a time when their truth could not 
possibly have been realized to the degree which it actu- 
ally is at present, even if all human power had been com- 
bined for extending instead of extinguishing the gospel. 
The diffusion of knowledge was then extremely difficult ; 
the art of printing was then unknown ; and many coun- 
tries which the gospel has now reached were then undis- 
covered. And multiplied as books now are, more than 
at any former period of the history of man, — extensive as 
the range of commerce is, beyond what Tyre, or Carthage, 
or Rome could have ever boasted, — the dissemination 

* Were it even to be conceded— as it never will in reason be — that the causes 
assigned by Gibbon for the rapid extension of Christianity were adequate and 
true, one difficulty, great as it is, would only be removed for the substitution 
of a greater. For what human ingenuity, though gifted with the utmost reach 
of discrimination, can ever attempt the solution of the question — how were ail 
these occult causes (for hidden they must then have been), which the genius 
of Gibbon first discovered, foreseen, their combination known, and all their 
wonderful effects distinctly described for many centuries prior to their exist- 
ence — or to the commencement of the period of their alleged operation] 



48 PROPAGATION AND EXTENT 

of the Scriptures surpasses both the one and the other ; 
they have penetrated regions unknown to any work of 
human genius, and untouched even by the ardour of com- 
mercial speculation ; and, with the prescription of more 
than seventeen centuries in its favour, the prophecy 
of the poor prisoner of Patmos is now exemplified, and 
thus proved to be more than a mortal vision, in the un- 
exampled communication of the everlasting gospel unto 
them that dwell on the earth, to every nation, and kin- 
dred, and tongue, and people. Christianity is professed 
over Europe and America. Christians are settled through- 
out every part of the earth. The gospel is now trans- 
lated into one hundred and fifty languages and dialects 
which are prevalent in countries from the one extremity 
of the world to the other. And what other book since 
the creation has ever been read or known in a tenth part 
of the number ] Whatever may be the secondary causes 
by which these events have been accomplished, or what- 
ever may be the opinion of men respecting them, the 
predictions which they amply verify must have origin- 
ated by inspiration from Him who is the first Great 
Cause. What divine warrant equal to this alone can all 
the speculations of infidelity supply, or can any free- 
thinker produce, for disbelieving the gospel ] 

It is apparent, on a general view of the prophecies 
which refer to Christ and to the Christian religion, that 
they include predictions relative to many of the doctrines 
of the gospel which are subjects of pure revelation, or 
which reason of itself could never have discovered ; and 
these very doctrines, to which the self-sufficiency of hu- 
man wisdom is often averse to yield assent, are thus to 
be numbered in this respect among the criterions of the 
truth of divine revelation ; for if these doctrines had not 
been contained in Scripture, the prophecies respecting 
them could not have been fulfilled. And the more won- 
derful they appear, they were by so much the more un- 
likely or inconceivable to have been foretold by man, and 
to have been afterward imbodied in a system of religion. 

It is also evident that there are many prophecies appli- 
cable to Jesus to which no allusion is made in the his- 
tory of his life. The minds of his disciples were long - 
impressed with the prejudices arising from the lowliness 
of his mortal state which were prevalent among the 
Jews ; and they viewed the prophecies through the mist 
of those traditions which had magnified the earthly power 



OF CHRISTIANITY. 49 

to which alone they looked, and obscured the divine na- 
ture of the expected reign of the Messiah. It was only- 
after the resurrection of Christ, as the Scripture informs 
us, that their understandings were opened to know the 
prophecies. But while the accomplishment of many of 
these predictions is thus unnoticed in the New Testa- 
ment, the fulfilment of each and all of them is written as 
with a pen of iron in the life, and doctrine, and death of 
Jesus ; and the undesigned and unsuspicious proof, thus 
indirectly but amply given, is now stronger than if an 
appeal had been made to the prophecies in every instance ; 
and, freed from the prejudices of the Jews, we may now 
combine and compare all the antecedent prophecies re- 
specting the Messiah with the narrative of the New Tes- 
tament, and with the nature and history of Christianity ; 
and, having seen how the former is a transcript of the 
latter, we may draw the legitimate conclusion, that the 
spirit of prophecy is indeed the testimony of Jesus. 

And may it not, on a review of the whole, be warrant- 
ably asserted, that the time and the place of the birth of 
Christ, the tribe and the family from which he was de- 
scended, the manner of his life, his character, his mira- 
cles, his sunerings and his death, the nature of his doc- 
trine, — and the fate of his religion, that it was to proceed 
from Jerusalem, that the Jews would reject it, that it 
would be opposed and persecuted at first, that it would 
be extended to the Gentiles, that idolatry would give way 
before it, that kings would submit to its authority, and 
that it would be spread throughout many nations, even to 
the most distant parts of the earth, — were all of them 
subjects of ancient prophecy 1 

Why, then, were so many prophecies delivered ] Why 
from the calling of Abraham to the present time, have 
the Jews been separated as a peculiar people from all the 
nations of the earth ? Why, from the age of Moses to 
that of Malachi, during the space of one thousand years, 
did a succession of prophets arise, all testifying of a Sa- 
viour that was to come 1 Why was the book of pro- 
phecy sealed for nearly four hundred years before the 
coming of Christ ] Why is there still to this day undis- 
puted, if not miraculous, evidence of the antiquity of all 
these prophecies, by their being sacredly preserved in 
every age in the custody and guardianship of the enemies 
of Christianity ? Why was such a multiplicity of facts 
predicted that are applicable to Christ, and to him alone? 
5 C 



50 PROPHECIES CONCERNING 

Why, but that all this mighty preparation might usher in 
the gospel of righteousness, and that, like all the works 
of the Almighty, his word through Jesus Christ might 
never be left without a witness of his wisdom and his 
power. And if the prophecies which testify of the gos- 
pel and of its Author display, from the slight glance which 
has here been given of them, any traces of the finger of 
God, how strong must be the conviction which a full 
view of them imparts to the minds of those who dili- 
gently search the Scriptures, and see how clearly they 
testify of Christ 1 



CHAPTER III 

PROPHECIES CONCERNING THE DESTRUCTION OF JERUSALEM. 

The commonwealth of Israel, from its establishment 
to its dissolution, subsisted for more than fifteen hundred 
years. In delivering their law, Moses assumed more 
than the authority of a human legislator, and asserted 
that he was invested with a divine commission ; and in 
enjoining obedience to it, after having conducted them to 
the borders of Canaan, he promises many blessings to 
accompany their compliance with the law, and denounces 
grievous judgments that would overtake them for the 
breach of it. The history of the Jews in each succeed- 
ing age attests the truth of the last prophetic warning 
of the first of their rulers ; but too lengthened a detail 
would be requisite for its elucidation. Happily, it con- 
tains predictions applicable to more recent events which 
admit not of any ambiguous interpretation, and refer to 
historical facts that admit no cavil. He who founded 
their government foretold, notwithstanding the interven- 
tion of so many ages, the manner of its overthrow. 
While they were wandering in the wilderness, without a 
city and without a home, he threatened them with the 
destruction of their cities and the devastation of their 
country. While they viewed for the first time the land 
of Palestine, and when victorious and triumphant they 
were about to possess it, he represented the scene of 



THE DESTRUCTION OF JERUSALEM. 51 

desolation that it would exhibit to their vanquished and 
enslaved posterity on their last departure from it. Ere 
they themselves had entered it as enemies, he describes 
those enemies by whom their descendants were to bo 
subjugated and dispossessed, though they were to arise 
from a very distant region, and although they did not 
appear till after a millenary and a half of years : — " The 
Lord shall bring a nation against thee from far — from the 
end of the earth — as swift as the eagle flieth — a nation 
whose tongue thou shaft not understand,— a nation 
of fierce countenance, which shall not regard the person 
of the old, nor show favour to the young. And he shall 
eat the fruit of thy cattle and the fruit of thy land until 
thou be destroyed, which also shall not leave thee either 
corn, wine, or oil, or the increase of thy kine, or flocks 
of thy sheep, until he have destroyed thee; and they 
shall besiege thee in all thy gates, until thy high-fenced 
walls come down wherein thou trustest throughout all 
thy land."* Each particular of this prophecy, though it 
be only introductory to others, has met its full comple- 
tion. The remote situation of the Romans, the rapidity 
of their march, the very emblem of their arms, their un- 
known language and warlike appearance, the indiscrimi- 
nate cruelty and unsparing pillage which they exercised 
towards the persons and the property of the Jews, could 
scarcely have been represented in more descriptive terms. 
Vespasian, Adrian, and Julius Severus removed with 
part of their armies from Britain to Palestine, — the ex- 
treme points of the Roman world. The eagle was the 
standard of their armies, and the utmost activity and ex- 
pedition were displayed in the reduction of Judea. They 
were a nation of fierce countenance, — a race distinct 
from the effeminate Asiatic troops. At Gadara and Ga- 
mala, throughout many parts of the Roman empire, and 
in repeated instances at Jerusalem itself, the slaughter 
of the Jews was indiscriminate, without distinction of 
age or sex. The inhabitants were enslaved and ban- 
ished, all their possessions confiscated, and the kingdom 
of Israel, humbled at first into a province of the Roman 
empire, became at last the private property of the empe- 
ror^ Throughout all the land of Judea every city was 
besieged and taken, and their high and fenced walls were 
razed from the foundation. But the prophet particular- 

* Deut. xxviii. 49, <fcc. 
G2 



52 PROPHECIES CONCERNING 

izes incidents the most shocking to humanity, which 
mark the utmost possible extremity of want and wretch- 
edness, the last act to which famine could prompt de- 
spair, and the last subject of a prediction that could have 
been uttered by man : — " And thou shalt eat the fruit of 
thine own body, the flesh of thy sons and of thy daugh- 
ters, in the siege and In the straitness wherewith thine 
enemies shall distress thee ; so that the man that is ten« 
der among you and very delicate, his eye shall be evil 
toward his brother, and toward the wife of his bosom, 
and toward the remnant of his children which he shall 
leave ; so that he will not give to any of them of the 
flesh of his children whom he shall eat, because he hath 
nothing left him in the siege and in the straitness where- 
with thine enemies shall distress thee in all thy gates. 
The tender and delicate woman among you which would 
not adventure to set the sole of her foot upon the ground 
for delicateness and tenderness, her eye shall be evil to- 
ward the husband of her bosom, and toward her son, 
and toward her daughter, and toward her young one, 
and toward her children which she shall bear ; for she 
shall eat them for want of all things, secretly, in the 
siege and straitness wherewith thine enemy shall distress 
thee in thy gates."* Six hundred years posterior to this 
prediction, when Samaria, then the capital of Israel, was 
besieged by all the host of the king of Syria, the most 
loathsome substitute for food was of great price, and an 
ass's head was sold for eighty pieces of silver.f When 
Nebuchadnezzar besieged Jerusalem, the famine pre- 
vailed in the city, and there was no bread for the people 
of the land. And Josephus relates the direful calamities 
of the Jews in their last siege, before they ceased to have 
a city. The famine was too powerful for all other pas- 
sions ; for what was otherwise reverenced was in this 
case despised. Children snatched the food out of the 
very mouths of their fathers ; and even mothers, over- 
coming the tenderest feelings of nature, took from their 
perishing infants the last morsels that could sustain their 
lives. In every house where there was the least shadow 
of food a contest arose; and the nearest relatives strug- 
gled with each other for the miserable means of subsis y - 
ence.J He adds a most revolting detail. While in all 
these cases the eye of man was thus evil towards his 

* Deut. xxviii. 53, &c. f 2 Kings vi. 4. 

t Joseph. Ae Bello, 1, 6, 3, § 4. 



THE DESTRUCTION OF JERUSALEM. 53 

brother in the siege and in the straitness wherewith their 
enemies distressed them, — the unparalleled inhuman com- 
pact between the tw r o women of Samaria; the bitter 
lamentation of Jeremiah over the miseries of the siege 
which he witnessed, — " The hands of the pitiful women 
have sodden their own children, they were their meat in 
the destruction of the daughter of my people ;" and the 
harrowing recital by Josephus of the noble lady killing 
with her own hands and eating secretly her own suck- 
ling (the discovery of which struck even the whole suf- 
fering city with horror), which are all recorded as facts, 
without the least allusion to the prediction, — too faith- 
fully realize to the very letter the dread denunciations 
of the prophet. When any well-authenticated facts of 
so singular and appalling a nature were predicted for 
ages, they could not possibly have been revealed but by 
inspiration from that Omniscience which alone can fore- 
see the termination of the iniquities of nations. 

Moses and the other prophets foretold also that the 
Jews would be left few in 'number — that they would 
be slain before their enemies — that the pride of their 
power would be broken — that their cities would be laid 
waste — that they would be destroyed and brought to 
naught — plucked from off the land — sold for slaves — and 
that none would buy them — that their high places were 
to be desolate — and their bones to be scattered around 
their altars — that Jerusalem was to be encamped round 
about — to be besieged with a mount — to have forts 
raised against it — to be ploughed over as a field, and to 
become heaps ; — that the end was to come upon it, and 
tnat the Lord would judge them according to their ways, 
and recompense them for all their abominations; the 
sword without, and the pestilence and the famine within ; 
— " he that is in the field shall die with the sword, and he 
that is in the city, famine and pestilence shall devour him."* 

These predictions relative to the siege and destruction 
of Jerusalem, whrich are recorded in the Pentateuch and 
in the subsequent prophecies, accord with the minute pro- 
phetic narrative which Jesus gave of the same sad event. 
Any adequate delineation of it alone would far surpass 
the limits of this treatise. But the subject has been fully 
and frequently illustrated, and the prediction harmonizes 
so completely with the unimpeachable testimony of im- 

* Lev. xxvi.30, &c. Deut. xxviii. 62, &c. Isa. xxix. 3. Ezek. vi. 5. Micab 
iii. 12. Jer. xxvi. 18. Ezek. vii. 7-9-15. 

5* 



54 PROPHECIES CONCERNING 

partial historians, that it is merely necessary, for the elu- 
cidation of its truth, to compare the prophetic descrip- 
tion with the historical facts. 

Besides frequent allusions in his discourses and para- 
bles,* the predictions of Christ concerning Jerusalem 
are recorded at length by three of the Evangelists. They 
are omitted by the Apostle John, in whose writings alone, 
from the age to which he lived, their insertion would 
have been suspicious. They were delivered to the disci- 
ples of Christ in answer to those direct questions which 
they put, in their surprise and alarm, at his declaration 
of the fate of the temple, " When shall these things be ? 
When shall be the sign of them, and of the end of the 
world]" The reply embraces all the subjects of the 
query, and is equally circumstantial and distinct. The 
death of Christ happened thirty-seven years previous to 
the destruction of Jerusalem. By the unanimous testi- 
mony of antiquity, the three gospels were published, 
and at least two of the Evangelists were dead, several 
years before that event. Copies of the gospels were dis- 
seminated so extensively and rapidly, that any deceit 
must have been instantaneously detected by the powerful, 
and numerous, and watchful enemies of the Cross. And 
the evidence of the prior publicity of the gospels was 
so strong, that it remained unchallenged by Julian, by 
Porphyry, or by Celsus. The authenticity of the pro- 
phecy thus rests on sure grounds, and the facts in which 
it received its accomplishment are incontestable. Jose- 
phus was one of the most distinguished generals in the 
commencement of the Jewish war; he was an eye- 
witness of the facts which he records ; he appeals to 
Vespasian and to Titus for the truth of his history : it 
received the singular attestation of the subscription of 
the latter to its accuracy : it was published while the 
facts were recent and notorious ; and the extreme care- 
fulness with which he avoids the mention of the name 
of Christ, in the history of the Jewish war, is not less 
remarkable than the great precision with which he de- 
scribes the events that verify his predictions. Not a few 
f the transactions are also related by Tacitus, Philos- 
tratus, and Dion Cassius. 

The different prophecies of Christ respecting Jerusa- 
lem may be condensed into a single view : 

* Matt. xxi. 18, 19-33; xxii. 1-7; xxv. 14-SO. Mark xi. 12, 13-20, &c. 
Lukexiii. 6-9; xiv. 17-24; xx. 9-19; xxiii. 27-31. 



THE DESTRUCTION Of JERUSALEM. £& 

" And Jesus went out and departed from trie temple ; 
and his disciples came to him for to show him the build- 
ings of the temple.* And Jesus said unto them, See ye 
not all these things ; verily I say unto you, there shall 
not be left here one stone upon another that shall not be 
thrown down. And as he sat upon the Mount of Olives, 
the disciples came unto him privately, saying, Tell us 
when shall these things be : and what shall be the sign 
of thy coming, and of the end of the world 1 And Jesus 
answered and said unto them, Take heed that no man 
deceive you, for many shall come in my name saying, I 
am Christ, and shall deceive many. And the time draws 
near ; and ye shall hear of wars, and rumours of wars, — 
or commotions : these things must first come to pass, 
but the end is not yet. Nation shall rise against nation 
and kingdom against kingdom, and great earthquakes 
shall be in divers places, and famines, and pestilences, and 
fearful sights, and great signs shall there be from heaven. 
All these things are the beginning of sorrows. But, be- 
fore all these things, shall they lay their hands upon you, 
and persecute you, delivering you up to the synagogues 
and in prisons, being brought before kings and rulers for 
my name's sake. And many shall be offended. Ye 
shall be betra)"ed both by parents and brethren, and kins- 
folk and friends ; and some of you shall they cause to be 
put to death, and ye shall be hated of all men for my 
name's sake. But there shall not a hair of your head 
perish. And many false prophets will arise and will de- 
ceive many ; and, because iniquity shall abound, the love 
of many shall wax cold. And the gospel must first be 
published among all nations, and then shall the end come. 
When ye, therefore, shall see Jerusalem encompassed 
with armies, and the abomination of desolation stand in 
the holy place, and where it ought not, then let them which 
are in Judea flee to the mountains, and let him which is 
in the midst of it depart out. Let him which is on the 
housetop not go down into the house, neither enter there- 
in to take any thing out of his house. Neither let him 
that is in the field turn back again for to take up his 
garment, for these are the days of vengeance. But wo 
unto them, that are with child, and to them that give suck 
in those days ; for there will be great distress in the land, 
and wrath upon this people — and they shall fall by the 
edge of the sword, and shall be led captive into all na- 

* Matt. xxiv. Mark xiii. Luke xxi. 



56 PROPHECIES CONCERNING 

tions. There shall be great tribulation, such as was not 
from the beginning of the world to this time — no, nor 
ever shall be, — -and Jerusalem shall be trodden down oi 
the Gentiles, until the time of the Gentiles be fulfilled. 
This generation shall not pass away till all these things be 
done. 

" Wo unto you, scribes and Pharisees — fill ye up the 
measure of your fathers. Behold I send unto you pro 
phets, and wise men, and scribes, and some of them ye 
will scourge in your synagogues, and persecute from city 
to city. All these things shall be done in this genera- 
tion. O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the 
prophets, and stone st them that are sent unto you, how 
often would I have gathered thy children together, even 
as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye 
would not. Behold, your house is left unto you deso- 
late ; for I say unto you, Ye shall not see me henceforth 
till ye shall say, Blessed is he that cometh in the name 
of the Lord.* 

" When he came near, he beheld the city, and wept 
over it, saying, If thou hadst known, even thou, at least 
in this thy day, the things which belong to thy peace ; 
but now they are hid from thine eyes.f For the days 
shall come upon thee, that thine enemies shall cast a 
trench about thee, and compass thee round, and keep 
thee in on every side, and shall lay thee even with the 
ground, and thy children within thee ; and they shall not 
leave in thee one stone upon another, because thou 
knowest not the time of thy visitation." 

These prophecies from the Old Testament and from 
the New repel the charge of ambiguity. They are 
equally copious and clear. History attests the truth of 
each and all of them ; and a recapitulation of them forms 
an enumeration of the facts. False Ckrists appeared. 
Simon Magus boasted that he was some great one. — 
Dositheus, the Samaritan, pretended that he was the 
lawgiver prophesied of by Moses. — Theudas, promising 
the performance of a miracle, persuaded a great multi- 
tude to follow him to Jordan, and deceived many. J The 
country was filled with impostors and deceivers, who 
induced the people to follow them into the wilderness ; 
— their credulity became the punishment of their pre- 
vious skepticism, and, in one instance, the tumult was so 

* Matt, xxiii. 34. t Luke xix. 41 

% Joseph. Ant. xx. 5, 1 ; Jos. xx. 7, 5. 



THE DESTRUCTION OF JERUSALEM. 57 

great that the soldiers took two hundred prisoners, 
and slew twice that number. There were wars and ru- 
mours of ivars ; nation rose against nation, and kingdom 
against kingdom. The Jews resisted the erection of the 
statue of Caligula in the temple ; and such was the 
dread of Roman resentment, that the fields remained un- 
cultivated. * At Caesarea, the Jews and the Syrians con- 
tended for the mastery of the city. Twenty thousand 
of the former were put to death, and the rest were ex- 
pelled. Every city in Syria was then divided into two 
armies, and multitudes were slaughtered. Alexandria 
and Damascus presented a similar scene of bloodshed. 
About fifty thousand of the Jews fell in the former, and 
ten thousand in the latter.f The Jewish nation rebelled 
against the Romans ; Italy was convulsed with conten- 
tions for the empire ; and, as a proof of the troublous 
and warlike character of the period, within the brief 
space of two years, four emperors, Nero, Galba, Otho, 
and Vitellius, suffered death. There were famines, pesti- 
lences, and earthquakes in divers places. In the reign of 
Claudius Caesar there were different famines. They 
continued to be severe for several years throughout the 
land of Judea. Pestilence succeeded them. In the same 
reign there were earthquakes at Rome, at Apamea, and 
at Crete. In that of Nero there was an earthquake in 
Campania, and another in which Laodicea, Hierapolis 
and Colosse were overthrown, and others are recorded 
to have happened in various places before the destruc- 
tion of the city of Jerusalem.^ " The constitution of 
nature," says the Jewish historian,^ " was confounded for 
the destruction of men, and one might easily conjecture 
that no common calamities were portended. And there 
were fearful sights and signs from heaven. Tacitus and 
Josephus agree in relating and in describing events so 
surprising and supernatural, that their narrative perfectly 
accords with the previous prediction. || And the fact 
cannot be disputed, that, whatever these sights were, the 

* Joseph, de Bell. 1. ii. 18, 1, 2. 

t Joseph, lib. ii. c. 13 ; c. 18, 1, 2, 7, 8. 

% Suet. Vit. Clan. 18. Tac. Ann. 1. 12, c 43, L 14, c 27. Jos. iv. 6. Tac. 1. 
xiv. 27 ; xii. 43, 58. 

<5 Jos. iv. 4. 

|"| Evenerant prodigia, quae neque hostiis, neque votis piare fas habet gens 
superstitioni obnoxia religionibus adversa. Visae per ccelum concurrere acies, 
rutilantia arma, et subito nubium igne collucere templum. Expassae repente 
deJubri fores et audita major humana vox excedere deos ; simul ingens motup 
eicedeiitium. — Tacit. Hist. i. 5, c, 13. 

C3 



58 PROPHECIES CONCERNING 

minds of men were impressed with the idea that they 
were indeed signs from heaven : and even this could never 
have been foreseen by man. There is surely something 
at least unaccountable in their prediction and in their re- 
lation by historians unprejudiced and unfriendly to the 
cause which their testimony supports. The disciples of 
Jesus were persecuted, imprisoned, afflicted, and hated of all 
nations, for his name's sake, and many of them were put to 
death, Petor, Simeon, and Jude were crucified.* Paul 
was beheaded ; Matthew, Thomas, James, Matthias, 
Mark, and Luke were put to death in different countries, 
and in various manners. There was a war against the 
very name. They were accused of hatred to the human 
race. The prejudices and the interest of the supporters 
of paganism were every where against them ; and, in 
one memorable instance, Nero, to screen himself from 
the guilt of being the incendiary of his capital, accused 
the innocent but hated Christians of that atrocious deed, 
and inflicted upon them the most excruciating tortures. f 
He made their sufferings a spectacle and a sport to the 
Romans. To compensate for his disappointment in not 
trampling on the ashes of Rome, as well as to cloak his 
iniquity, the monster (for the man and the monarch were 
both laid aside) gratified his savage lust of cruelty by 
the substitution of one feast for another : he selected 
the Christians for his victims, from the general odium 
under which they lay — and their very name became the 
warrant for that selection, and sufficed to sanction the 
infliction of miheard of barbarities. Many shall be of- 
fended, and shall betray one another ; and the love of many 
shall wax cold. The Apostle of the Gentiles often com- 
plained of false brethren, that many turned away from 
him, and that he stood alone, forsaken by all, when he 
first appeared before Nero. And Tacitus testifies that 
very many were convicted, on the evidence of others 
who had previously been accused. But the gospel was 
published throughout the ivorld, in defiance of all peril and 
prosecution. In the age of the apostles, epistles were 
addressed to Christians at Rome, Corinth, Ephesus, Phi* 
lippi, Colosse, Thessalonica, and in Pontus, Galatia, Cap- 
padocia, Asia, and Bithynia. After Christ delivered this 
prophecy, he was in a little time forsaken by all his dis- 
ciples, and put to death as a criminal. At their first 

* Cave's Lives of the Apostles. Dupin. f Tac. Ann. 1. xv. c. 44» 



THE DESTRUCTION OF JERUSALEM. 59* 

assembly, they were a little flock, the number of the 
names together were about a hundred and twenty. And, 
unpromising as the prospect was, a few fishermen of 
Galilee, aided afterward by a tent-maker of Tarsus, cir- 
cumscribed not their labours, in the preaching of the 
gospel, by the boundaries of the Roman empire. Could 
the reception or the fate of Christ himself have war- 
ranted such a conclusion ] Did ever any cause triumph 
by such means 1 or was ever any cause opposed like 
this 1 And could any thing be more unlikely to have 
been clearly foreseen, and positively afhrmed ] All these 
events preceded the destruction of Jerusalem, and then 
the end of that city was at hand. The signs of its 
approaching ruin are given as a warning to depart from 
it. Jerusalem was encompassed with armies. The Roman 
armies, with their idolatrous ensigns, which were an 
abomination to the Jews, surrounded it — but, instead of 
being a signal for flight, this would naturally have implied 
the impossibility of escape, and the warning would have 
been in vain. Yet the words of Jesus did not deceive 
his disciples. Cestius Gallus, the Roman general, be- 
sieged Jerusalem ; but immediately after, contrary to 
all human probability, an interval was given for escape. 
He suddenly and causelessly retreated, though some of 
the chief men of the city had offered to open to him the 
gates. Josephus acknowledges that the utmost con- 
sternation prevailed among the besieged — and that the 
city would infallibly have been taken."* And he attri- 
butes it to the just vengeance of God, that the city and 
the sanctuary were not then taken, and the war termi- 
nated at once. He relates also how many of the most 
illustrious inhabitants departed from the city, as from a 
sinking vessel ; and how, upon the approach of Vespa- 
sian afterward, multitudes fled from Jericho into the 
mountainous country. Thither, and to the city of Pella, 
fled all the disciples of Jesus, as credible historians 
assert.f And amid all the succeeding calamities, not a 
hair of their heads did perish. 

There shall be great tribulation, such as was not from the 
beginning of the ivorld to this time — no, nor ever shall be. 
There shall be great distress in the land, and wrath upon 
this people. 'These are the days of vengeance. Such are 
some of the words of Jesus, relative to the destruction 

* Joseph. 1. 2, c. 19,20. 

t Epiphanius in Heres, Kazar, c 7. Eusebii* Ec> Hist, lib* iii. c. 3L 



60 PROPHECIES CONCERNING 

of Jerusalem ; and all the previous prophecies regarding 
it were of the same sad import. The particulars of the 
siege are all related by Josephus, and form a detail of 
miseries that admit not of exaggeration ; and which he 
repeatedly declares, in terms that entirely accord with- 
the language of prophecy, are altogether unequalled in 
the history of the world. — No general description can 
give a just idea of calamities the most terrible that ever 
nation suffered. The Jews had assembled in their city 
from all the surrounding country, to keep the feast of 
unleavened bread. It was crowded with inhabitants, 
when they were all imprisoned within its walls. The 
passover, which was commemorative of their first great 
deliverance, had collected them for their last signal de- 
struction. Before any external enemy appeared, the 
fiercest dissensions prevailed — the blood of thousands 
was shed by their brethren ; they destroyed and burned 
in their phrensy their common provisions for the siege ; 
they were destitute of any regular government, and 
divided into three factions. On the extirpation of one 
of these, each of the others contended for the mastery. 
The most ferocious and frantic — the robbers or zealots, 
as they are indiscriminately called, prevailed at last. 
They entered the temple, under the pretence of offering 
sacrifices, and carried concealed weapons for the pur- 
pose of assassination. They slew the priests at the very 
altar ; and their blood, instead of that of the victims for 
sacrifice, fiowed around it. They afterward rejected all 
terms of peace with the enemy : none were suffered to 
escape from the city — every house was entered — every 
article of subsistence was pillaged — and the most wanton 
barbarities were committed. Nothing could restrain 
their fury : wherever there was the appearance or scent 
of food, the human bloodhounds tracked it out ; and, 
though a general famine raged around; though they 
were ever trampling on the dead ; and though the habi- 
tations for the living were converted into charnel-houses, 
nothing could intimidate, or appal, or satisfy, or shock 
them, till Mary, the daughter of Eleazar, a lady once 
rich and noble, displayed to them and offered them all 
her remaining food, the scent of which had attracted 
them in their search — the bitterest morsel that ever 
mother or mortal tasted — the remnant of her half-eaten 
suckling. — Sixty thousand Roman soldiers unremittingly 
besieged them ; they encompassed Jerusalem with a 



THE DESTRUCTION OF JERUSALEM. 61 

wall, and hemmed them in on every side.; they brought 
down their high and fenced walls to the ground ; they 
slaughtered the slaughterers, they spared not the people ; 
they burned the temple in defiance of the commands, the 
threats, and the resistance of their general. With it 
the last hope of all the Jews was extinguished. They 
raised at the sight a universal but an expiring cry of 
sorrow and despair. Ten thousand were there slain, 
and six thousand victims were enveloped in its blaze. 
The whole city, full of the famished dying and of the 
murdered dead, presented no picture but that of despair 
— no scene but of horror. The aqueducts and the city- 
sewers were crowded as the last refuge of the hopeless. 
Two thousand were found dead there, and many were 
dragged from thence and slain. The Roman soldiers 
put all indiscriminately to death, and ceased not till they 
became faint and weary and overpowered with the work 
of destruction. Bat they only sheathed the sword to 
light the torch. They set fire to the city in various 
places. The flames spread every where, and were 
checked but for a moment by the red streamlets in every 
street. Jerusalem became heaps, and the Mountain of 
the house as the high places of the forest. Within the 
circuit of eight miles, in the space of five months — foes 
and famine, pillage and pestilence, within — a triple wall 
around, and besieged every moment from without — 
eleven hundred thousand human beings perished — though 
the tale of each of them was a tragedy. Was there ever 
so concentrated a mass of misery ] Could any prophecy 
be more faithfully and awfully fulfilled] The prospect 
of his own crucifixion, when Jesus was on the way to 
Calvary, was not more clearly before him, and seemed 
to affect him less, than the fate of Jerusalem. How full 
of tenderness, and fraught with truth, was the sympa- 
thetic response of the condoling sufferer to the wailings 
and lamentations of the women who followed him, when 
he turned unto them, and beheld the city, which some 
of them might yet see wrapped in flames and drenched in 
blood, and said, " Daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for 
me, but weep for yourselves and for your children. For 
behold, the clays are coming, in the which they will say, 
Blessed are the barren, and the womb that never bare, 
and the paps which never gave suck. Then shall they 
begin to say to the mountains, Fall on us, and to the 
hills, Cover us. For if they do these things in the green 
6 



02 PROPHECIES CONCERNING 

tree, what shall be done in the dry?" No impostor ever 
betrayed such feelings as a man, nor predicted events 
so unlikely, astonishing, and true, as an attestation of a 
divine commission. Jesus revealed the very judgments 
of God ; for such the instrument by whom it was ac- 
complished interpreted the capture and destruction of 
Jerusalem, acknowledging that his own power would 
otherwise have been ineffectual. When eulogized for 
the victory, Titus disclaimed the praise, affirming, that 
he was only the instrument of executing the sentence 
of the divine justice. And their own historian asserts, 
in conformity with every declaration of Scripture upon 
the subject, that the iniquities of the Jews were as un- 
paralleled as their punishment. 

All these prophecies, of which we have been review- 
ing the accomplishment, were delivered in a time of per- 
fect peace, when the Jews retained their own laws, and 
enjoyed the protection, as they were subject to the au- 
thority, of the Roman empire, then in the zenith of its 
power. The wonder excited in the minds of his disci- 
ples at the strength and stability of the temple drew forth 
from Jesus the announcement of its speedy and utter ruin. 
He foretold the appearance of false Christs and pretended 
prophets ; the wars and rumours of wars ; the famines, 
and pestilences, and earthquakes, and fearful sights that 
were to ensue ; the persecution of his disciples ; the apos- 
tacy of many ; the propagation of the gospel ; the sign 
that should warn his disciples to fly from approaching 
ruin ; the encompassing and enclosing of Jerusalem ; the 
grievous affliction of the tender sex; the unequalled 
miseries of all ; the entire destruction of the city ; the 
shortening of their sufferings, that still some might be 
saved ; and that all this dread crowd of events, which 
might well have occupied the progress of ages, was to 
pass away within the limits of a single generation. None 
but He who discerns futurity could have foretold and 
described all these things : and their complete and literal 
fulfilment shows them to be indubitably the revelation 
of God. 

But the prophecies also mark minuter facts, if possi- 
ble more unlikely to have happened. Jerusalem was to 
be ploughed over as a field ; to be laid even with the 
ground ; of the temple one stone was not to be left upon 
another ; the Jews were to be few in number ; to be led 
captive into &tt nations .* to be sold for slaves, and none 



THE DESTRUCTION OF JERUSALEM. 63 

would buy them. And each of these predictions was 
strictly verified. Titus commanded the whole city and 
temple to be razed from the foundation. The soldiers 
were not then disobedient to their general. Avarice 
combined with duty and with resentment : the altar, the 
temple, the walls, and the city were overthrown from 
the base, in search of the treasures which the Jews, be- 
set on every hand by plunderers, had concealed and 
buried during the siege. Three towers and the remnant 
of a wall alone stood, the monument and memorial of 
Jerusalem ; and the city was afterward ploughed over 
by Terentius Rums. In the siege, and in the previous 
and subsequent destruction of the cities and villages of 
Judea, according to the specified enumeration of Jose- 
phus, about one million three hundred thousand suffered 
death ; ninety-seven thousand were led into captivity. 
'They were sold for slaves, and were so despised and dis- 
esteemed, that many remained unpurchased. And their 
conquerors were so prodigal of their lives, that, in honour 
of the birthday ojf Domitian, two thousand five hundred 
of them were placed, in savage sport, to contend with 
wild beasts, and otherwise to be put to death.* 

But the miseries of their race were not then at a close. 
There was a curse on the land, that hath scathed it, a 
judgment on the people that hath scattered them through- 
out the world. Many prophecies respecting them yet 
remain to be considered, and much of their history is 
yet untold. The prophecies are as clear as the facts are 
visible. 

* Tacitus, who flourished about thirty years after the destruction of Jerusa- 
lem, speaks cf the strength of the fortifications of that city, the immense riches 
and strength of the temple, the factions that raged during the siege, as well as 
of the prodigies that preceded its fall. And he particularly mentions the large 
army brought by Vespasian to subdue Judea, " a fact which shows the mag- 
nitude and importance of the expedition." Philostratus particularly relates 
that Titus declared, after the capture of Jerusalem, that he was not worthy of 
the crown of victory, as he had only lent his hand to the execution of a work, 
in which God was pleased to manifest his anger. Dion Cassius records the 
conquest of Judea by Titus and Vespasian, the obstinate and bloody resistance 
Cf the Jews during the siege, the destruction of the temple by fire. It is re- 
corded by Maimonides, and in the Jewish Talmud (as cited by Basnage and 
Lardner) that Terentius Rufus, an officer in the Roman army, lore up, with 
a ploughshare, the foundations of the temple. The triumphal arch of Titus, 
commemorative of the destruction of Jerusalem, and with figures of Roman 
soldiers, bearing on their shoulders the holy vessels of the temple, is still to 
be seen at Rome. 



64 PROPHECIES CONCERNING 



CHAPTER IV. 

PROPHECIES CONCERNING THE JEWS. 

While Moses, as a divine legislator, promised to the 
Israelites that their prosperity, and happiness, and peace 
would all keep pace with their obedience, he threatened 
them with a gradation of punishments, rising in propor 
tion to their impenitence and iniquity ; — and neither in 
blessings nor in chastisements hath the Ruler among the 
nations dealt in like manner with any people. But their 
wickedness and consequent calamities greatly prepon- 
derated, and are yet prolonged. The retrospect of the 
history of the Jews, since their dispersion, could not, at 
the present day, be drawn in truer terms than in the un- 
propitious auguries of their prophet above three thou- 
sand two hundred years ago. In the most ancient of all 
records, we read the lively representation of the present 
condition of the most singular people upon earth. Moses 
professed to look through the glass of ages : the revo- 
lution of many centuries has brought the object imme- 
diately before us — we may scrutinize the features of fu- 
turity as they then appeared to his prophetic gaze, — and 
we may determine between the probabilities whether they 
were conjectures of a mortal, who " knows not wdiat a 
day may bring forth," or the revelation of that Being, 
" in whose sight a thousand years are but as yesterday." 

" I will scatter you among the heathen and draw out 
a sword after you, — and your land shall be desolate, and 
your cities waste ; and upon them that are left of you I 
will send a faintness into their hearts, in the land of their 
enemies ; and the sound of a shaken leaf shall chase 
them — and they shall flee as fleeing from a sword — and 
they shall fall when none pursueth — and ye shall have 
no power to stand before your enemies — and ye shall 
perish among the heathen ; — and the land of y our ene- 
mies shall eat you up — and they that are left of you shall 
pine away in their iniquity in your enemies' land ; and 
also, in the iniquities of their fathers, shall they pine 
away with them, — and yet for all that, when they be in 
the land of their enemies, I will not cast them away, 



THE JEWS. 65 

neither will I abhor them to destroy them utterly.* And 
the Lord shall scatter you among the nations, and ye 
shall be left few in number among the heathen whither 
the Lord will lead you.f The Lord shall cause thee to 
be smitten before thine enemies — thou shalt go out one 
way against them, and flee seven ways before them — 
and shall be removed into all the kingdoms of the earth. J 
The Lord shall smite thee with madness, and blindness, 
and astonishment of heart, — and thou shalt grope at noon- 
day as the blind gropeth in darkness, and thou shalt not 
prosper in thy ways, and thou shalt be only oppressed 
and spoiled evermore, and no man shall save thee. Thy 
sons and thy daughters shall be given to another people. 
There shall be no might in thine hand. The fruit of thy 
land and all thy labour shall a nation which thou knowest 
not eat up, and thou shalt be only oppressed and crushed 
alway — so that thou shalt be mad for the sight of thine 
eyes which thou shalt see. The Lord shall bring thee 
unto a nation which neither thou nor thy fathers have 
known, — and thou shalt become an astonishment, a pro- 
verb, and a by-word among all the nations whither the 
Lord shall lead thee. Because thou servedst not the Lord 
thy God with joyfulness and with gladness of heart for 
the abundance of all things, therefore shalt thou serve 
thine enemies which the Lord shall send against thee, in 
hunger and in thirst — and in nakedness, and in want of 
all things — and he shall put a yoke of iron upon thy 
neck, until he have destroyed thee. — And the Lord will 
make thy plagues wonderful, and the plague of thy seed, 
even great plagues and of long continuance.^ All these 
curses shall come upon thee, and shall pursue thee, and 
overtake thee, and they shall be upon thee for a sign and 
for a wonder, and upon thy seed for ever, — and it shall 
come to pass, that as the Lord rejoiced over you to do 
you good, and to multiply you — so the Lord will rejoice 
over you to destroy and to bring you to naught, and ye 
shall be plucked from off the land whither thou goest to 
possess it, and the Lord will scatter thee among all 
people, from the one end of the earth even unto the 
other — and among these nations shalt thou find no ease, 
Neither shall the sole of thy foot have rest ; but the Lord 
shall give thee there a trembling heart, and failing of 
eyes, and sorrow of mind — and thy life shall hang ia 

*Lev. xxvi. 33, 36, 37, 38, 39, 44. \ Deut. iv. 27. 

t Deut. xxviii. 25, 28, 29, 32, 33, 34. 37-45, 46 <i Deut. xxviii. 47.43, 59. 

6* 



66 PROPHECIES CONCERNING 

doubt before thee, and thou shalt fear day and night, and 
shalt have none assurance of thy life. In the morning 
thou shalt say, would God it were even ! and at even thou 
shalt say, would God it were morning! for the fear of 
thine heart wherewith thou shalt fear, and for the sight 
of thine eyes which thou shalt see."* 

The writings of all the succeeding prophets abound 
with similar predictions. " I will cause them to be re- 
moved into all nations of the earth. I will cast them 
out into a land that they know not, where I will show 
them no favour. I will feed them with wormwood, and 
give them water of gall to drink.f I will scatter them 
also among the heathen — whom neither they nor their 
fathers have known. I will deliver them to be removed 
into all the kingdoms of the earth for their hurt, to be a re- 
proach, a proverb, a taunt, and a curse in all places whither 
I shall drive them ; and I will send the sword, the famine, 
and the pestilence among them, till they be consumed 
from off the land that I gave unto them and to their fathers. J 
I will bereave them of children. I will deliver them to 
be removed into all the kingdoms of the earth, to be a 
curse, and an astonishment, and a hissing, and a re- 
proach, even among all the nations whither I have driven 
them.§ I will execute judgment in thee— and the whole 
remnant of thee will I scatter into all the winds. || I 
will scatter them among the nations, among the heathen, 
and disperse them in the countries.^ They shall cast 
their silver in the streets, and their gold shall be removed 
■ — their silver and their gold shall not be able to deliver 
them in the day of the wrath of the Lord, — they shall 
not satisfy' their souls, neither fill their bowels, because 
it is the stumblingblock of their iniquity.** I will sift 
the house of Israel among the nations, like as corn is 
sifted in a sieve, yet shall not the least grain fall upon 
the earth. Death shall be chosen rather than life by all 
the residue of them that remain of this evil family, which 
remain in all the places whither I have driven them, saith 
the Lord of Hosts. They shall be wanderers among the 
nations.f \ Make the heart of this people fat, and make 
their ears heavy, and shut their eyes, lest they see with 
their eyes, and hear with their ears, and convert and be 
healed. Then saidl, Lord, how long? and he answered, 

* Deut. xxviii. 63-67, t Jer. ix. 16. { Jer. xxiv. 9, 10 ; xv. 7 

§ Jer. xxix. 18. || Ezek. v. 10. IT- Ezek. xii. 15. 

** Ezek. vii. 19. ft Amos ix.9. Jer. viii. 3. Hos. ix. 17. 



THE JEWS. 67 

Until the cities be' wasted, without inhabitants, and the 
nouses without man, and the land be utterly desolate, — 
and the Lord have removed men far away — and there be a 
great forsaking in the midst of the land.* Though they 
go into captivity before their enemies, thence will I com- 
mand the sword, and it shall slay them, — and I will 
set mine eyes upon them for evil, and not for good. Bat 
he that scattereth Israel will gather him and keep him.f 
And, fear not thou, my servant Jacob, and be not dis- 
mayed, Israel ; for behold I will save thee from afar 
off, and thy seed from the land of their captivity. I will 
make a full end of all the nations whither I have driven 
thee ; but I will not make a full end of thee, but correct 
thee in measure ; yet will I not utterly cut thee off, or 
leave thee wholly unpunished.;): The children of Israel 
shall abide many days without a king, and without a 
prince, and without a sacrifice, and without an image, 
and without an ephod, and without teraphim. After- 
ward shall the children of Israel return, and seek the 
Lord their God, and David their king, and shall fear the 
Lord and his goodness, in the latter days."§ 

All these predictions respecting the Jews are delivered 
with the clearness of history and the confidence of 
truth. They represent the manner, the extent, the 
nature, and the continuance of their dispersion — their 
persecutions — their blindness — their sufferings — their 
feebleness — their fearfulness — their pusillanimity — their 
ceaseless wanderings — their hardened impenitence — ■ 
their insatiable avarice — and the grievous oppression — 
the continued spoliation — the marked distinction — the 
universal mockery — the unextinguishable existence, and 
unlimited diffusion of their race. They were to he plucked 
from off their own land — smitten before their enemies — 
consumed from off their own land, and left few in number. 
The Romans destroyed their cities and ravaged their 
country, and the inhabitants who escaped from the famine, 
the pestilence, the sword, and the captivity were forci- 
bly expelled from Judea, and fled as houseless wanderers 
into all the surrounding regions. But they clung, for a 
time, around the land which their fathers had possessed 
for so many ages, and on which they looked as an inher- 
itance allotted by Heaven to their race ; and they would 
not relinquish their claim to the possession of it by any 

* Ts. vi. 10, 11, 12. t Jer. xxxi. 10. 

$ Jer. xlvi. 27, 28. $ Hos, iii. 4, & 



68 PROPHECIES CONCERNING 

single overthrow, however great. Unparalleled as were 
the miseries which they had suffered in the slaughter of 
' their kindred, the loss of their property and their homes, 
the annihilation of their power, the destruction of their 
capital city, and in the devastation of their country by 
Titus — yet the fugitive and exiled Jews soon resorted 
again to their native soil ; and sixty years had scarcely 
elapsed, when, deceived by an impostor, allured by the 
hope of a triumphant Messiah, and excited to revolt by 
intolerable oppression, they strove, by a vigorous and 
united, but frantic effort, to reconquer Judea — to cast 
off the power of the Romans, which had everywhere 
crushed them, and to rescue themselves and their coun- 
try from ruin. A war, which their enthusiasm and des- 
peration alike protracted for two years, and in which, 
exclusive of a vast number that perished by famine, and 
sickness, and fire, five hundred and eighty thousand Jews 
are said to have been slain, — terminated in their entire • 
discomfiture and final banishment. They were so beset 
on every side, and cut down in detached portions by 
the Roman soldiers, that, in the words of a heathen his- 
torian, very few of them escaped. Fifty of their strong- 
holds were razed to the ground, and their cities sacked 
and consumed by fire ; Judea was laid waste and left as 
a desert.* Though a similar fate never befell any other 
people without proving the extirpation of their race or 
the last of their miseries, that awful prediction, in its 
reference to the Jews, met its full completion — which 
yet they survived to await, in every country, when exiles 
from their own, an accumulation of almost unceasing 
calamities, protracted throughout many succeeding ages. 
The cities shall he wasted without inhabitant. Every city 
shall be forsaken, and not a man dwell therein. They were 
rooted out of their land in anger, and in wrath, and in great 
indignation.^ A public edict of the emperor Adrian ren- 
dered it a capital crime for a JewJ to set a foot in Jeru- 
salem ; and prohibited them from viewing it even at a 
distance. Heathens, Christians, and Mahometans have 
alternately possessed Judea : it has been the prey of the 
Saracens : — the descendants of Ishmael have often over- 
run it : the children of Israel have alone been denied the 
possession of it, though thither they ever wish to return 
— and though it forms the only spot on earth where the 

* Dion, lib. lxix. t Isaiah vi. 11. Jer.iv. 29. Peut. xxix. 28. 

i Tert Ap. c. 21. Basnage's Continuation of Josephus, b vi. sect. 1 



THE JEWS. 69 

ordinances of their religion can be observed. And, amid 
all the revolutions of states, and the extinction of many 
nations, in so long a period, the Jews alone have not only 
ever been aliens in the land of their fathers, but when- 
ever any of them have been permitted, at any period 
since the time of their dispersion, to sojourn there, they 
have experienced even more contumelious treatment 
than elsewhere. Benjamin of Tudela, who travelled in 
the twelfth century through great part of Europe and of 
Asia, found the Jews everywhere oppressed, partiadas^ 
in the Holy Land, And to this day (while the Jews 
who reside in Palestine, or who resort thither in old age 
that their bones may not be laid in a foreign land, are 
alike ill-treated and abused by Greeks, Armenians, and 
Europeans)* the haughty deportment of the despotic 
Turkish soldier, and the abject state of the poor and 
helpless Jews, are painted to the life by the prophet. 
The stranger that is within thee shall get up above thee very 
high, and thou shalt come down very low.\ 

But the extent is still more remarkable than the man- 
ner of their dispersion. Many prophecies describe it, 
and foretold, thousands of years ago, what we now be- 
hold. They have been scattered among the nations, — among 
the heathen, — among the people, even from one end of the 
earth unto the other. They have been removed into all the 
kingdoms of the earth ; the whole remnant of them hath 
been scattered into all the winds ; they have been dispersed 
throughout all countries, and sifted among the nations like 
as corn is sifted in a sieve, and yet not the least grain has 
fallen upon the earth — though dispersed throughout all 
nations, they have remained distinct from them all. And 
there is not a country on the face of the earth where the 
Jews are unknown. They are found alike in Europe, 
Asia, America, and Africa. They are citizens of the 
world, without a country. Neither mountains, nor rivers, 
nor deserts, nor oceans, — which are the boundaries of 
other nations, — have terminated their wanderings. They 
abound in Poland, in Holland, in Russia, and in Turke)^ 
In Germany, Spain, Italy, France, and Britain they are 
more thinly scattered. In Persia, China, and India — on 
the east and on the west of the Ganges, — they are 
few in number among the heathen. They have trod the 
snows of Siberia, and the sands of the burning desert ; — 

* Ger eral Straton's MS. Travels. f Dent, xxviii 43. 



70 PROPHECIES CONCERNING 

and the European traveller hears of their existence in 
regions which he cannot reach, — even in the very inte- 
rior of Africa, south of Timbuctoo.* From Moscow to 
Lisbon — from Japan to Britain — from Borneo to Archan- 
gel — from Hindostan to Honduras, no inhabitant of any 
nation upon the earth would be known in all the inter- 
vening regions but a Jew alone. 

But the history of the Jews throughout the whole 
world, and in every age since their dispersion, verifies 
the most minute predictions concerning them, — and to 
a recital of facts too well authenticated to admit of dis- 
pute, or too notorious for contradiction, may be added 
a description of them all in the very terms of the pro- 
phecy. In the words of Basnage, the elaborate histo- 
rian of the Jews — "Kings have often employed the 
severity of their edicts and the hands of the executioner 
to destroy them — the seditious multitude has performed 
massacres and executions infinitely more tragical than 
the princes. Both kings and people, heathens, Christians, 
and Mahometans, who are opposite in so many things, 
have united in the design of ruining this nation, and have 
not been able to effect it. The Bush of Moses, surrounded 
with flames, has always burnt without consuming. The 
Jews have been driven from all places of the world, 
which has only served to disperse them in all parts of the 
universe. They have, from age to age, run through 
misery and persecution, and torrents of their own blood. "f 
Their banishment from Judea was only the prelude to 
their expulsion from city to city, and from kingdom to 
kingdom. Their dispersion over the globe is an irrefra- 
gable evidence of this, and many records remain that 
amply corroborate the fact. Not only did the first and 
second centuries of the Christian era see them twice 
rooted out of their own land, but each succeeding century 
has teemed with new calamities to that once chosen but 
now long-rejected race. The history of their sufferings 
is a continued tale of horror. Revolt is natural to the 
oppressed ; and their frequent seditions were productive 
of renewed privations and distresses. Emperors, kings, 
and califs all united in subjecting them to the same " iror 
yoke." Constantino, after having suppressed a revolt 
which they raised, and having commanded their ears to 
be cut off, dispersed them as fugitives and vagabonds 

* Lyon's Travels in Africa, P 146 j Basnage, b. vi. c. 1. 



TKE JEWS. 71 

into different countries, whither they carried, in terror 
to their kindred, the mark of their suffering and infamy. 
In the fifth century they were expelled from Alexandria, 
which had long- been one of their safest places of resort. 
Justinian, from whose principles of legislation a wiser 
and more humane policy ought to have emanated, yielded 
to none of his predecessors in hostility and severity 
against them. He abolished their synagogues — pro- 
hibited them even from entering into caves for the exer- 
cise of their worship — rendered their testimony inadmis- 
sible, and deprived them of the natural right of bequeath- 
ing their property ; and when such oppressive enactments 
led to insurrectionary movements among the Jews, their 
property was confiscated, many of them were beheaded, 
and so bloody an execution of them prevailed, that, as 
is expressly related, " all the Jews of that country trem- 
bled :"* a trembling heart was given them. In the reign 
of the tyrant Phocas, a general sedition broke out among 
the Jews in Syria. They and their enemies fought with 
equal desperation. They obtained the mastery in An- 
tioch ; but a momentary victory only led to a deeper 
humiliation, and to the infliction of more aggravated 
cruelties than before. They were soon subdued and 
taken captive ; many of them were maimed, others exe- 
cuted, and all the survivors were banished from the city. 
Gregory the Great afforded them a temporary respite 
from oppression, which only rendered their spoliation 
more complete, and their suffering more acute, under 
the cruel persecutions of Heraclius. That emperor, 
unable to satiate his hatred against them by inflicting a 
variety of punishments on those who resided within 
his own dominions, and by finally expelling them from 
the empire, exerted so effectually against them his influ- 
ence in other countries, that they suffered under a general 
and simultaneous persecution from Asia to the farthest 
extremities of Europe. f In Spain, conversion, imprison- 
ment, or banishment were their only alternatives. In 
France, a similar fate awaited them. They fled from 
country to country, seeking in vain any rest for the sole 
of their foot. Even the wide extended plains of Asia 
afforded them no resting-place, but have often been 
spotted with their blood, as well as the hills and valleys 
of Europe. Mahomet, whose imposture has been the 

* Easnage's Hist. b. vi. c. 21. sect 0. t lb. sect. 17, 



72 PROPHECIES CONCERNING* 

law and the faith of such countless millions, has, from 
the precepts of the Koran, infused into the minds of his 
followers a spirit of rancour and enmity towards thtf 
despised and misbelieving Jews. He set an early ex- 
ample of persecution against them, which the Mahomet- 
ans have not yet ceased to imitate. In the third year 
of the Hegira, he besieged the castles which they pos- 
sessed in the Hegiasa, compelled those who had fled to 
them for refuge and defence to an unconditional surren- 
der, banished them the country, and parted their property 
among his Mussulmans. He dissipated a second time 
their recombined strength, massacred many of them, 
and imposed upon the remnant a permanent tribute. — 
The Church of Rome ever ranked and treated them as 
heretics. The canons of different councils pronounced 
excommunication against those "who should favour 
or uphold the Jews against Christians — enjoined all 
Christians neither to eat nor to hold any commerce with 
them — prohibited them from bearing public offices or 
having Christian slaves — appointed them to be distin- 
guished by a mark — decreed that their children should 
be taken from them, and brought up in monasteries ; and, 
what is equally descriptive of the low estimation in which 
they were held, and of the miseries to which they were 
subjected, there was often a necessity, even for those 
who otherwise oppressed them, to ordain that it was not 
lawful to take the life of a Jew without any cause.* — 
Hallam's account of the Jews during the middle ages is 
short, but significant. "They were everywhere the 
objects of popular insult and oppression, frequently of a 
general massacre. A time of festivity to others was 
often the season of mockery and persecution to them. 
It was the custom at Toulouse to smite them on the 
face every Easter. At Beziers they were attacked with 
stones from Palm Sunday to Easter, an anniversary of 
insult and cruelty generally productive of bloodshed, and 
to which the populace were regularly instigated by a 
sermon from the bishop.f It was the policy of the kings 
of France to employ them as a sponge to suck their sub- 
jects' money, which they might afterward express with 
less odium than direct taxation would incur. It is almost 
incredible to what a length extortion of money from the 



* Dupin's Ecc. Hist. Canons of different councils. 
t Kallam, vol. i. 2, 33, c. ii. p. 2. 



THE JEWS. 73 

Jews was carried. A series of alternate persecution 
and tolerance was borne by this extraordinary people 
with an invincible perseverance, and a talent of accumu- 
lating riches which kept pace with the exactions of their 
plunderers. Philip Augustus released all Christians in 
Iris dominions from their debts to the Jews, reserving a 
fifth part to himself. He afterward expelled the whole 
nation from France." St. Louis twice banished, and twice 
recalled them; and Charles VI. finally expelled them 
from France. From that country, according to Meze- 
ray, they were seven times banished. They were ex- 

Eelled from Spain ; and, by the lowest computation, one 
undred and seventy thousand families departed from 
that kingdom.* "At Verdun, Treves, Mentz, Spires, 
Worms,, many thousands of them were pillaged and 
massacred. A remnant was saved by a feigned and 
transient conversion ; but the greater part of them barri- 
cadoed their houses, and precipitated themselves, their 
families, and their wealth into the rivers or the flames. 
These massacres and depredations on the Jews were 
renewed at each crusade."f In England, also, they suf- 
fered great cruelty and oppression at the same period. 
During the crusades, the whole nation united in the 
persecution of them. In a single instance, at York, fif- 
teen hundred Jews, including women and children, were 
refused all quarter — could not purchase their lives at any 
price — and, frantic with despair, perished by a mutual 
slaughter. Each master was the murderer of his family, 
when death became their only deliverance. The scene 
of the castle of Massada, which was their last fortress 
in Palestine, and where nearly one thousand perished in 
a similar manner,^ was renewed in the castle of York. 
So despised and hated were they, that the barons, when 
contending with Henry III., to ingratiate themselves 
with the populace, ordered seven hundred Jews to be 
slaughtered at once, their houses to be plundered, and 
their synagogue to be burned. Richard, John,§ and 

* Basnage, b. vii. c. 21. t Gibbon's Hist. vol. vi. p. 17. 

J Basnage, b. vii. c. 10, sect. 20, Rapin's Hist, of England, vol. iii. p. 97; 
Joseph, b. vii. ch. 8. 

§ The persecutions to which the Jews were subjected at that period are 
described with strict truth in the historical romance of Ivanhoe. They are 
characterized as <; a race which, during these dark ages, was alike detested by 
the credulous and prejudiced vulgar, and persecuted by the greedy and rapa- 
cious nobility."— (vol. i. p. 83.) — "Except perhaps the flying-fish, there was no 
race existing on the earth, in the air, or the waters, who were the objects of 
euch an unremitting, general, and relentless persecution as the Jews of this 

7 D 



74 PROPHECIES CONCERNING 

Henry III. often extorted money from them ; and the 
last, by the most unscrupulous and unsparing measures, 
usually defrayed his extraordinary expenses with their 
spoils, and impoverished some of the richest among 
them. His extortions at last became so enormous, and 
his oppressions so grievous, that, in the words of the 
historian, he reduced the miserable wretches to desire 
leave to depart the kingdom ;* but even self-banishment 
was denied them. Edward I. completed their misery, 
seized on all their property, and banished them the king- 
dom. Above fifteen thousand Jews were rendered des- 
titute of any residence, were despoiled to the utmost, 
and reduced to ruin. Nearly four centuries elapsed be- 
fore the return to Britain of this abused race. 

Some remarkable circumstances attest, without a pro- 
longed detail of their miseries, that they have been a 
people everywhere peculiarly oppressed. The first un- 
equivocal attempt at legislation in France was an ordi- 
nance against the Jews. And towards them alone one 
of the noblest charters of liberty on earth — Magna 
Charta, the Briton's boast — legalized an act of injustice.-)- 
For many ages after their dispersion, they found no 
resting-place in Europe, Africa, or Asia, but penetrated 
n search of one to the extremities of the world. In 
Mahometan countries they have ever been subject to 

period. Upon the slightest and most unreasonable pretences, as well as upon 
accusations the most absurd and groundless, their persons and property were 
exposed to every turn of popular fury ; for Norman, Saxon, Dane, and Britor., 
however adverse the races were to each other, contended which would look 
with greatest detestation upon a people whom it was accounted a point of reli- 
gion to hate, to revile, to despise, to plunder, and to persecute. The kings of the 
Norman race, and the independent nobles, who followed their example in ail 
acts of tyranny, maintained against this devoted people a persecution of a more 
regular, calculated, and self-interested kind. It is a well-known story of King 
John, that he confined a wealthy Jew in one of the royal castles, and daily 
caused one of his teeth to be torn out, until, when the jaw of the unhappy 
Israelite was half-disfurnished, he consented to pay a large sum which it was 
the tyrant's object to extort from him. The little ready money that was in the 
country was chiefly in the possession of this persecuted people, and the nobility 
hesitated not to tbllow the example of their sovereign in wringing it from them 
>«y every species of oppression, and even personal torture." (p. 120, 121.) — The 
fictitious history of Isaac of York is delineated in a manner equally descriptive 
of the facts, and confirmatory of the prophecies respecting the Jewish people; 
and there exists not the history of any individual of any ot her nation, whether 
drawn from fancy or from fact, which combines so many of the prophetic char- 
acteristics of the fate of a Jew, as that which has thus been delineated, by a 
master's hand, as a representation of their condition, at a period about twenty- 
six centuries posterior to the prediction, and in a country two thousand rnilcs 
remote from the place where it was first uttered, and from the only land e»ei 
possessed by the Jews. 

* Rapin's Hist, of £??*., t. viii. vol. iii.p. 405. \ Ari.cles xii. Xiii. 



THE JEWS. 75 

persecution, contempt, and every abuse. They are in 
general confined to one particular quarter of every city 
(as they formerly were to Old Jewry in London) ; they 
are restricted to a peculiar dress ; and in many places 
shut up at stated hours. In Ramadan, as in all parts of 
Persia, " they are an abject race, and support themselves 
by driving a peddling trade ; they live in a state of great 
misery — pay a monthly tax to the government — and are 
not permitted to cultivate the ground, or to have landed 
possessions."* They cannot appear in public, much 
less perform their religious ceremonies, without being 
treated with scorn and contempt, j The revenues of the 
Prince of Bohara are derived from a tribute paid by five 
hundred families of Jews, who are assessed according 
to the means of each. In Zante they exist in miserable 
indigence, and are exposed to considerable oppression.^ 
AX Tripoli, when any criminal is condemned to death, 
the first Jew who happens to be at hand is compelled to 
become the executioner, — a degradation to the children 
of Israel to which no Moor is ever subjected.^ In 
Egypt they are despised and persecuted incessantly. || 
In Arabia they are treated with more contempt than in 
Turkey.^ The remark is common to the most recent 
travellers both in Asia and Africa,** that the Jews them- 
selves are astonished, and the natives indignant, at any 
act of kindness, or even of justice, that is performed 
towards any of this " despised nation" and persecuted 
people. In Southey's Letters from Spain and Portugal, 
this remarkable testimony is borne respecting them: 
" Till within the last fifty years the burning of a Jew 
formed the highest delight of the Portuguese ; they 
thronged to behold this triumph of the faith, and the 
very women shouted with transport as they saw the 
agonized martyr writhe at the stake. Neither sex nor 
age could save this persecuted race ; and Antonio Joseph 
de Silvia, the best of their dramatic writers, was burned 
alive because he was a Jew." Few years have elapsed 
since there was a severe persecution against them in 
Prussia and in Germany, and in several of the smaller 
states of the latter country they are not permitted to 

* Morier's Travels, p. 379. 
t Sir J. Malcolm's Hist, of Persia, vol. ii. p. 425. 

% Hugh's Travels, vol. i. p. 150. § Lyon's Travels, p. 16. 

|| Denon's Travels in Egypt, vol. i. p. 213. 
*r Niebhur's Travels, vol. i. p. 408. 

** Mnrier's Travels in Pervsia, p. 266. Lvon's Travels in Africa, p. 32. 
D2 " 



76 PROPHECIES CONCERNING 

sell any goods even in the common markets. The pope 
has lately re-enacted some severe edicts against them : 
and ukases have recently been issued in quick succes- 
sion,* restraining the Jews from all traffic throughout 
the interior government of Russia. They are absolutely 
prohibited (on pain of immediate banishment) from 
" offering any article to sale,"f whether in public or private, 
either by themselves or by others. They are not allowed 
to reside, even for a limited period, in any of the cities 
of Russia, without an express permission from govern- 
ment, which is granted only in cases where their ser- 
vices are necessary, or directly beneficial to the state. 
A refusal to depart when they become obnoxious to so 
rigid a law subjects them to be treated as vagrants ; and 
none are suffered to protect or to shelter them. Though 
the observance of such edicts must, in numerous in- 
stances, leave them destitute of any means of support, 
yet their breach or neglect exposes them to oppression 
under the sanction of the law, and to every privation 
and insult without remedy or appeal. And though they 
may thus become the greatest objects of pity, all laws 
of humanity are reversed, by imperial decrees, towards 
them. For those who harbour Jews that are condemned 
to banishment for having done what all others may in- 
nocently do, are, as the last Russian ukase respecting 
them bears, " amenable to the laws as the abetters of 
vagrants,"f an ^ as m numberless instances besides, no 
man shall save them. 



* 15th November, 1797. 25tli February, 1823. 8th June, 1826. (August 
or November), 1827. 

t Ukase, quoted from "The World," of date 31st October, 1827. lb. 
Article viii. 

+ Note. — While the prophecies describe the past and existing miseries of 
the Jews, they refer with no less precision to the time yet to come, when the 
children of Israel shall have returned to the loved land of their fathers, and 
their rebuke shall have ceased from off the face of the earth, and when they 
shall prize their blessings the more highly, as contrasted with the former sui' 
ferings of their race. And the Word of God, confirmed as its prophetic tmtk 
is by the workings of the wrath of man, and by the policy of earthly nion- 
archs, will doubtless triumph over the highest mandates of mortals, and 
receive new illustrations of its truth when these shall have passed away. 
And the eleventh article of the ukase now in force merits, in reference to a 
special prediction, particular notice, and may here be subjoined, together with 
its corresponding text, premising merely that it is to a specific district of dis- 
membered Poland thai the Rabbis are sent awaj . " Kabhins. or other religions 
functionaries, are to be sent away by the police officer, immediately on the dis- 
covery that they are such.'' " Thy teachers shall not be removed into a corner 
any more, but thine eyes shall see thy teachers." Isaiah xxx< 20. 

Lord Byron's brief and emphatic description of the Jews is equally charac 
teristic of the fact, and illustrative of the predictions. 



THE JEWS. 77 

These facts, though they form but a brief and most 
imperfect record, and therefore but a very faint image 
of all their sufferings, show that the Jews have been re- 
moved, into all kingdoms for their hurt — that a sword has 
been drawn after them. — that they have found no rest for the 
sole of their foot — that they have not been able to stand 
before their enemies; — there has been no might in their hands 
— their very avarice has proved their misery — they have been 
spoiled evermore — they have been oppressed and crushed 
alway — they have been mad for the sight of their eyes that 
they did see, as the tragical scenes at Mossada, and York, 
and many others testify — they have often been left in 
hunger, and thirst, and nakedness, and in want of all things ; 
— a trembling heart, and sorrow of mind have been their 
portion ; — they have often had none assurance of their life ; 
— their plagues have been wonderful and great, and of long 
continuance, — and that they have been for a sign and for a 
wonder during many generations. 

But the predictions rest not even here. It was dis- 
tinctly prophesied that the Jews would reject the gospel ; 
that, from the meanness of his mortal appearance, and 
the hardness of their hearts, they would not believe in a 
suffering Messiah, — that they woidd be smitten ivith blind- 
ness and astonishment of heart — that they would continue 
long, having their ears deaf, their eyes closed, and their 
hearts hardened — and that they woidd grope at noonday as 
the blind gropeth in darkness.* And the great body of the 
Jewish nation has continued long to reject Christianity. 
They retain the prophecies, but discover not their light, 
having obscured them by their traditions. Many of 
their received opinions are so absurd and impious, their 
rites are so unmeaning and frivolous, their ceremonies 
are so minute, frivolous, and contemptible, — that the 
account of them would surpass credulity, were it not a 
transcript of their customs and of their manners, and 
drawn from their own authorities.! No words can more 
strikingly or justly represent the contrast between their 
irrational tenets — their degraded religion — their super- 
stitious observances, and the dictates of enlightened 



Tribes of the wandering foot and weary breast, 
When shall we flee away' and be at rest? 
" They shall find no rest for the sole of their foot — I will send a faintneaa 
into their heart.— a trembling heart and sorrow of mind." 
* Deut. xxviii. 29. 

t See Allen's Modern Judaism. Brewster's Ency. Art. Jews. 
7* 



78 PROPHECIES CONCERNING 

reason, and of the gospel which they vilify, than the 
emphatic description, " They grope at noonday, as the 
blind gropeth in darkness." And, if any other instances 
be wanting of the prediction of events infinitely exceed- 
ing human foresight, the dispositions of all nations 
respecting them are revealed as explicitly as their own. 
That the Jews have been a proverb, an astonishment, a 
by-word, a taunt, and a hissing among all nations, — 
though one of the most wonderful of facts, unparalleled 
in the whole history of mankind, and as inconceivable 
in its prediction as miraculous in its accomplishment, — 
is a truth that stands not in need of any illustration or 
proof — and of which witnesses could be found in every 
country under heaven. Many prophecies concerning 
the Jews, of more propitious import, that yet remain to 
be accomplished, are reserved for testimonies to future 
generations, if not to the present. But it is worthy of 
remark, as prophesied concerning them, that they have 
not been utterly destroyed, though a full end has been 
made of their enemies, — that the Egyptians, the Assy- 
rians, the Babylonians, the Romans — though some of the 
mightiest monarchies that ever existed, — have not a 
single representative on earth; while the Jews, op- 
pressed and vanquished, banished and enslaved, and 
spoiled evermore, have survived them all — and to this 
hour overspread the world. Of all the nations around 
Judea, the Persians alone, who restored them from the 
Babylonish captivity, yet remain a kingdom. 

The Scriptures also declare that the covenant with 
Abraham, — that God would give the land of Canaan to 
his seed for an everlasting possession, — would never be 
broken; but that the children of Israel shall be. taken 
from among the heathen, — gathered on every side, and 
brought into their own land, to dwell for ever where 
their fathers dwelt. Three thousand seven hundred 
years have elapsed since the promise was given to Abra- 
ham. And is it less than a miracle, that, if this promise 
had been made to the descendants of any but of Abra- 
ham alone, it could not now possibly have been realized, 
as there exists not on earth the known and acknow 
ledged posterity of any other individual, or almost of 
any nation, contemporary with him ? 

That the people of a single state (which was of very 
limited extent and power in comparison of some of the 
monarchies which surrounded it) should first have been 



THE JEWS. 79 

rooted up out of their own land in anger, wrath, and 
great indignation, the like of which was never expe- 
rienced by the mightiest among the ancient empires, 
which all fell imperceptibly away at a lighter stroke, — 
and that afterward, though scattered among all nations, 
and finding no ease among them all, they should have 
withstood eighteen centuries of almost unremitted per- 
secution, and that after so many generations have 
elapsed, they should still retain their distinctive form, 
or, as it may be called, their individuality of character, 
is assuredly the most marvellous event that is recorded 
in the history of nations ; and if it be not acknowledged 
as a " sign," it is in reality as well as in appearance " a 
wonder," the most inexplicable within the province of the 
philosophy of history. But that, after the endurance of 
such manifold woes, such perpetual spoliation, and so 
many ages of unmitigated suffering, during which their 
life was to hang in doubt within them, they should still 
be, as actually they are, the possessors of great wealth ; 
and that this fact should so strictly accord with the 
prophecy, which describes them, on their final restora- 
tion to Judea, as taking their silver and their gold with 
them ;* and also that, though captives or fugitives " few 
in number," and the miserable remnant of an extin- 
guished kingdom at the time they were " scattered 
abroad," — they should be to this hour a numerous people, 
— and that this should have been expressly implied in 
the prophetic declaration descriptive of their condition 
on their restoration to Judea, after all their wanderings, 
— that the land shall be too narrow by reason of the in- 
habitants, — and that place shall not be found for them,f 
are facts which as clearly show, to those who consider 
them at all, the operation of an overruling Providence, 
as the revelation of such an inscrutable destiny is the 
manifest dictate of inspiration. 

Such are the prophecies, and such are the facts respect- 
ing the Jews ; — and from premises like these the feeblest 
logician may draw a moral demonstration. If they had 
been utterly destroyed — if they had mingled among the 
nations, — if, in the space of nearly eighteen centuries 
after their dispersion, they had become extinct as a 
people, even if they had been secluded in a single region, 
and had remained united— if their history had been analo- 

* Isa. lx. 9. \ Isa. lxix. 19. Zech. x. 10. 



80 PROPHECIES CONCERNING 

gous to that of any nation upon the earth, an attempt 
might, with some plausibility or reason, have been made, 
to show cause why the prediction of their fate, however 
true to the fact, ought not in such a case to be sustained 
as evidence of the truth of inspiration. Or if the past 
history and present state of the Jews were not of a 
nature so singular and peculiar, as to bear out to the 
very letter the truth of the prophecies concerning them, 
with what triumph would the infidel have produced those 
very prophecies, as fatal to the idea of the inspiration of 
the Scriptures 1 And when the Jews have been scattered 
throughout the whole earth — when they have remained 
everywhere a distinct race — when they have been de- 
spoiled evermore, and yet never destroyed — when the 
most wonderful and amazing facts, such as never occurred 
among any people, form the ordinary narrative of their 
history, and fulfil literally the prophecies concerning 
them, — may not the believer challenge his adversary 
to the production of such credentials of the faith that is 
in htm ? They present an unbroken chain of evidence, 
each link a prophecy and a fact, extending throughout 
a multitude of generations, and not yet terminated. 
Though the events, various and singular as they are, 
have been brought about by the instrumentality of human 
means and the agency of secondary causes, yet they 
are equally prophetic and miraculous ; for the means 
were as impossible to be foreseen as the end and the 
causes were as inscrutable as the event ; and they have 
been, and still in numberless instances are, accomplished 
by the instrumentality of the enemies of Christianity. 
Whoever seeks a miracle, may here behold a sign and* a 
wonder, than which there cannot be a greater. And the 
Christian may bid defiance to all the assaults of his ene- 
mies from this stronghold of Christianity, impenetrable 
and impregnable on every side. 

These prophecies concerning the Jews are as clear as 
a narrative of the events. They are ancient as the oldest 
records in existence ; and it has never been denied that 
they were all delivered before the accomplishment of 
one of them. They were so unimaginable by human 
wisdom, that the whole compass of nature has never 
exhibited a parallel to the events. And the facts are 
visible, and present, and applicable even to a hair's 
breadth. Could Moses, as an uninspired mortal, have 
described the history, the fate, the dispersion, the treat- 



THJS J1SWS. 81 

merit, the dispositions of the Israelites to the oresent 
day, or for three thousand two hundred years, seeing 
that he was astonished and amazed, on his descent from 
Sinai, at the change in their sentiments and in their 
conduct in the space of forty days ] Could various per- 
sons have testified, in different ages, of the selfsame 
and of similar facts, as wonderful as they have proved 
to be true 1 Could they have divulged so many secrets 
of futurity, when, of necessity, they were utterly ignorant 
of them all? The probabilities were infinite against 
them. For the mind of man often fluctuates in uncer- 
tainty over the nearest events, and the most probable 
results ; but, in regard to remote ages, when thousands 
of years shall have elapsed, — and to facts respecting 
them, contrary to all previous knowledge, experience, 
analogy, or conception, — it feels that they are dark as 
death to mortal ken. And, viewing only the dispersion 
of the Jews, and some of its attendant circumstances — 
how their city was laid desolate — their temple, which 
formed the constant place of their resort before, levelled 
with the ground, and ploughed over like a field — the?r 
country ravaged, and themselves murdered in mass — 
falling before the sword, the famine, and the pestilence 
— how a remnant was left, but despoiled, persecuted, 
enslaved, and led into captivity — driven from their own 
land, not to a mountainous retreat, where they might 
subsist with safety, but dispersed among all nations, and 
left to the mercy of a world that everywhere hated and 
oppressed them — shattered in pieces like the wreck of a 
vessel in a mighty storm — scattered over the earth, like 
fragments on the waters — and, instead of disappearing, 
or mingling with the nations, remaining a perfectly dis- 
tinct people, in every kingdom the same, retaining similar 
habits, and customs, and creed, and manners in every 
part of the globe, though without ephod, teraphim, or 
sacrifice — meeting everywhere the same insult, and 
mockery, and oppression — finding no resting-place with- 
out an enemy soon to dispossess them — multiplying 
amid all their miseries — surviving their enemies — be- 
holding, unchanged, the extinction of many nations, and 
the convulsions of all -robbed of their silver and of their 
gold though cleaving to the love of them still, as the 
stumblingblock of tht.ir iniquity — often bereaved of their 
very children — disjoined and disorganized, but uniform 
and unaltered — ever bruised, but never broken — weak, 
D 3 



82 JUBEA. 

fearful, sorrowful, and afflicted — often driven to madness 
at the spectacle of their own misery — taken up in tlte 
lips of talkers — the taunt and hissing and infamy of all 
people, and continuing ever, what they are to this day, 
the sole proverb common to the whole world ; — how did 
every fact, from its very nature, defy all conjecture, and 
how could mortal man, overlooking a hundred successive 
generations, have foretold any one of these wonders that 
are now conspicuous in these latter times'? Who but 
the Father of Spirits, possessed of perfect prescience, 
even of the knowledge of the will and of the actions of 
free, intelligent, and moral agents, could have revealed 
their unbounded and yet unceasing wande rings — unveiled 
all their destiny — and unmasked the minds of the Jews, 
and of their enemies, in every age and in every clime ] 
The creation of a world might as well be the work of 
chance as the revelation of these things. It is a visible 
display of the power and of the prescience of God, — an 
accumulation of many miracles. And, although it forms 
but a part of a small portion of the Christian evidence, it 
lays not only a stone of stumbling — such as infidels 
would try to cast in a Christian's path, — but it fixes an 
insurmountable barrier at the very threshold of infidelity, 
immoveable by all human device, and impervious to 
every attack. 



CHAPTER V. 



PROPHECIES CONCERNING THE LAND OF JUDEA AND CIRCUPJ- 
JACENT COUNTRIES. 

The writings of the Jewish prophets not only described 
the fate of that people for many generations, subsequent 
to the latest period to which the most unyielding skepti- 
cism can pretend to affix the date of these predictions* 
but while the cities were teeming with inhabitants, and 
the land flowing with abundance, for centuries before 
Judea ceased to count its millions, they foretold the long 
reign of desolation that would ensue. The land is a 
witness as well as the people. Its aspect in the present 
day, and for many a past age, is the precise likeness 
delineated by the pencil oi prophecy, when every feature 



JUDEA. 83 

that could admit of change was the i everse of what it 
now is. And it is necessary only to compare the pre- 
dictions themselves with that proof of their fulfilment, 
which, were all other testimony to be excluded, heathens 
and infidels supply. 

The calamities of the Jews were to arise progressively 
with their iniquities. They were to be punished again 
and again, "yet seven times, for their sins."* And in 
the greatest of the denunciations which w^ere to fill up 
the measure of their punishments, the long-continued 
desolation of their country is ranked among the worst 
and latest of their woes ; and the prophecies respecting 
it, which admit of a literal interpretation, and which have 
been literally fulfilled, are abundantly clear and expressive. 

" I will make your cities waste, and bring your sanc- 
tuaries into desolation. And I will bring the land into 
desolation ; and your enemies which dwell therein shall 
be astonished at it. And I will scatter you among the 
heathen, and draw out a sword after you ; and your land 
shall be desolate and your cities waste. Then shall the 
land enjoy her Sabbaths, as long as it lieth desolate, and 
ye be in your enemies' land ; even then shall the land rest 
and enjoy her Sabbaths. The land also shall be left of 
them, and shall enjoy her Sabbaths while she lieth deso- 
late without them.f So that the generation to come of 
your children that shall rise up after you, and the stranger 
that shall come from a far land, shall say, when they see 
the plagues of that land, and the sicknesses which the Lord 
hath laid upon it, Wherefore hath the Lord done this 
unto the land, what meaneth the heat of this great anger ] 
The anger of the Lord was kindled against this land, to 
bring upon it all the curses that are wTitten in this book.J 
Your country is desolate, your cities burned with fire ; 
your land, strangers devour it in your presence, and deso- 
late as overthrown by strangers. And the daughter of 
Zion is left as a cottage in a vineyard, as a lodge in a 
garden of cucumbers, as a besieged city. Except the 
Lord of Hosts had left us a very small remnant, we 
should have been as Sodom, and we should have been 
like unto Gomorrah. § Ye shall be as an oak whose 
leaf fadeth, and as a garden that hath no water. j| I will 
lay my vineyard waste. Of a truth many houses shall 
be desolate, even great and fair, without inhabitant. 
Yea, ten acres of vineyard shall yield one bath, and the 

* Lev. xxvi. 18, 21, 24. t Lev. xxvi. 31, 45, 53. 

t Deut. xxix. 22, 24, W £ Isa. i. 7. 8, S. !| Isa. i. 30. 



84 JUDEA. 

seed of an homer shall yield an ephah. — There shall the 
lambs feed after their manner, and the waste places of the 
fat ones shall strangers eat.* Then said I, Lord, how 
long 1 and he answered, Until the cities be wasted with- 
out inhabitant, and the nouses without man, and the land 
be utterly desolate ; and the Lord have removed men far 
away, and there be a great forsaking in the midst of the 
land. But yet in it shall be a tenth ; and it shall return 
and shall be eaten ; as a teil-tree, and as an oak, whose 
substance is in them when they cast their leaves.f The 
Lord of Hosts shall make a consumption, even deter- 
mined, in the midst of all the land. J The glory of Jacob 
shall be made thin, and the fatness of his flesh shall wax 
lean ; and it shall be as when the harvest-man gathereth 
the corn, and reapeth the ears with his arm ; and it shall 
be as he that gathereth ears in the valley of Rephaim. 
Yet gleaning grapes shall be left in it, as the shaking of 
an olive-tree, two or three berries in the top of the up- 
permost bough, four or five in the outmost fruitful 
branches thereof, saith the Lord God of Israel.^ Behold 
the Lord maketh the earth|| (the land) empty, and maketh 
it waste, and turneth it upside down, and scattereth 
abroad the inhabitants thereof. The land shall be utterly 
emptied and utterly spoiled : for the Lord hath spoken this 
word. The earth (land) mourneth and fadeth away; it is 
defiled under the inhabitants thereof ; because they have 
transgressed the laws, changed the ordinance, broken the 
everlasting covenant. Therefore hath the curse devoured 
the land, and they that dwell therein are desolate, and 
few men left. The new wine mourneth, the vine lan- 
guisheth, all the merry-hearted do sigh. The mirth of 
tabrets ceaseth, the noise of them that rejoice endeth, 
the joy of the harp ceaseth. They shall not drink wine 
with a song ; strong drink shall be bitter to them that 
drink it. The city of confusion is broken down : every 
house is shut up that no man may come in. There is a 
crying for wine in the streets, all joy is darkened, the 

* Isa. v. 6, 9, 10, 17. f Isa. vi. 11, 12, 13. t Isa. x. 23. $ Isa. xvii. 4, 5, 6. 

\\ The twenty-fourth chapter of Isaiah contains a continuous prophetic de- 
scription (exactly analogous to other predictions) of the desolation of Judea, 
during the time that the " inhabitants thereof" were to be " scattered abroad ;" 
and it is only necessary, in order to prevent any appearance of ambiguity, to 
remark, that the very same word in the original which, in the English trans- 
lation, is here rendered earth, is in subsequent verses of the same chapter 
also translated Zand— evidently implying the land of Israel, the inhabitants of 
which were to be " scattered abroad ;" and so obviously is this the meaning 
of the word, that the chapter is properly entitled " the deplorable judgments 
of God upon the land." 



JUDEA. 85 

mirth of the land is gone. When thus it shall be in the 
midst of the land among the people, there shall be as the 
shaking of an olive-tree, and as the gleaning grapes when 
the vintage is done.* Yet the defenced city shall be 
desolate, and the habitation forsaken, and left like a wil- 
derness ; there shall the calf feed, and there shall he lie 
down and consume the branches thereof. When the 
boughs thereof are withered they shall be broken off: the 
women come and set them on fire ; for it is a people of 
no understanding. f Many days and years shall ye be 
troubled, ye careless women ; for the vintage shall fail, 
the gathering shall not come. Tremble, ye women that 
are at ease ; be troubled ye careless ones : strip you and 
make you bare, and gird sackcloth upon your loins. 
They shall lament for the teats, for the pleasant fields, 
for the fruitful vine. Upon the land of my people shall 
come up thorns and briers ; yea, upon all the houses of 
joy in the joyous city; because the palaces shall be for- 
saken, the multitude of the city shall be left ; the forts 
and towers shall be for dens for ever, a joy of wild asses, 
a pasture of flocks ; until the Spirit be poured upon us 
from on high, and the wilderness be a fruitful field, and 
the fruitful field be counted for a forest.J — The highways 
lie waste, the wayfaring man ceaseth ; he hath broken 
the covenant, he hath despised the cities, he regardeth 
no man. The earth mourneth and languisheth ; Lebanon 
is ashamed and hewn down; Sharon is like a wilderness ; 
and Bashan and Carmel shake off their fruits.^ De- 
struction upon destruction is cried ; for the whole land is 
spoiled. I beheld, and lo, the fruitful place was a wilder- 
ness, and all the cities thereof were broken down at the 
presence of the Lord ; for thus hath the Lord said, the 
whole land shall be desolate, yet will I not make a full 
end. For this shall the earth mourn, because I have 
spoken it, I have purposed it, and will not repent, neither 
will I turn back from it. || How long shall the land mourn 
and the herbs of every field wither, for the wickedness 
of them that dwelt therein 1 — I have forsaken mine house, 
I have left mine heritage. — Many pastors have destroyed 
my vineyard, they have trodden my portion under foot, 
they have made my pleasant portion a desolate wilder- 
ness. They have made it desolate, and being desolate it 
mourneth unto me ; the whole land is made desolate, be- 

*Isa. xxix. 12, IS. \ Isa. xxvii. 10. 11. t Isa. xxxiv. 10-15. 

$ Is?., xxxiii. 8, 9. |J Jer. iv. 20, 2<>-28. 



86 JUDEA. 

cause no man layeth it to heart. The spoilers are come 
upon all high places through the wilderness ; — no flesh 
shall have peace. They have sown wheat, but shall reap 
thorns ; they have put themselves to pain, but shall not 
profit ; and they shall be ashamed of your revenues be- 
cause of the fierce anger of the Lord.* Thus saith the 
Lord God to the mountains of Israel, and to the hills, and 
to the rivers, and to the valleys ; behold, I, even I, will 
bring a sword upon you, I will destroy your high places. 
In all your dwelling-places the cities shall be laid w T aste, 
and the high places shall be desolate, and your altars 
shall be laid waste and made desolate ; I will stretch out 
my hand upon them, and make the land more desolate 
than the wilderness towards Diblath, in all their habita- 
tions.! I will bring the worst of the heathen, and they 
shall possess their nouses : I will also make the pomp of 
the strong to cease ; and their holy places shall be de- 
filed. Say unto the people- of the land, thus saith the 
Lord God of the inhabitants of Jerusalem and of the land 
of Israel, They shall eat their bread with carefulness, and 
drink their water with astonishment, that her land may 
be desolate from all that is therein, because of the vio- 
lence of all them that dwell therein.^ Every one that 
passeth thereby shall be astonished. — Hear this, all ye 
inhabitants of the land. Hath this been in your days, or 
even in the days of your fathers ] Tell ye your children 
of it, and let your children tell their children, and their 
children another generation. That which the palmer- 
worrn hath left hath the locust eaten ; and that which the 
locust hath left hath the canker- w^orm eaten ; and that 
which the canker-worm hath left hath the caterpillar 
eaten. — The field is wasted, the land mourneth, and joy is 
withered from the sons of men. — And I will restore unto 
you the years that the locust hath eaten, and the canker- 
worm, and the caterpillar, and the palmer-worm. And 
my people shall never be ashamed.^ — The city that went 
out by a thousand shall leave a hundred, and that wilich 
went out by a hundred shall leave ten, to the house of 
Israel. Seek not Bethel. Bethel shall come to naught.|| 
— Behold I will set a plumb-line in the midst of my people 
Israel. I will not pass by them any more. And the high 
places of Isaac shall be desolate, and the sanctuaries of 
Israel shall be laid waste. Tf — I will make Samaria as an 

* Jer. xii. 4, 7, 10-1 3. t Ezek. vi. 2, 3, 6, 14. t Ezek. xii. 19. 

$ Joal i. 2, 4, 10, 12 ; ii. 25, 26. |j Amos v. 2, 5. 17 Amos vii. 8, 0. 



JUDEA. 87 

heap of the field, and as plantings of a vineyard ; and I 
will pour down the stones thereof into the valley, and I 
will discover the foundations thereof."* 

Numerous and clear as these denunciations are, yet 
such was the long-suffering patience of God, and such 
the rebellious spirit of the Israelites of old, that it had 
become a proverb in the land " the days are prolonged, 
and every vision faileth." But though that proverb 
ceased when great calamities did overtake them, and a 
temporary desolation came over their land, yet the 
curses denounced against it were not obliterated by a 
partial and transient fulfilment, but on the renewed and 
unrepented wickedness of the people, fell upon them and 
their land with stricter truth, and, as foretold, with 
sevenfold severity. 

Moses and all the prophets set blessings and curses 
before the Israelites, with the avowed purpose that they 
might choose between them. But while the prophetical 
writings abound with warnings, the Scriptural records 
of Israelitish history show how greatly these warnings 
were disregarded. The word of God, which is perfect 
work, abideth for ever : — and it returns not to him void, 
but fulfils the purpose for which he sent it. And after 
the statutes and judgments of the Lord had been set 
before the Israelites for the space of a thousand years 
from the time that they were first declared, the "burden 
of the word of the Lord to Israel by Maiachi," instead 
of speaking, even then, of repealed judgments, closes 
the Jewish Scriptures with this last command, " Remem- 
ber ye the law of Moses my servant, which I commanded 
unto him in Horeb for all Israel, with the statutes and 
judgments ;"f and, affixed to the command to remember 
these, the very last words of the Old Testament, which 
seal up the vision and the prophecies, plainly indicate 
that however long the God of Israel might bear with the 
Jews for transgressing the law, while the law only was 
given them, yet on their refusal to repent when the pro- 
phet, who was to be " the Messenger of the Lord," 
would be sent unto them, the Lord would come and 
M smite the earth, or land, with a curse." 

The term of the continuance of these judgments and 
of their full completion is distinctly marked, as com- 
mensurate with the dispersion of the Jews, and termi- 
nating with their final restoration. So long as they be 



88 JUDEA. 

in their enemies' land, their own land lieth desolate. 
The judgments were not to be removed from it " until 
the spirit be poured (upon the Jews) from on high, and 
the wilderness be a fruitful field."* And the prophecies 
not only portray Judea while forsaken of the Lord, 
his heritage left, and given into the hands of its enemies, 
but they also delineate the character and condition of 
the dwellers therein while its ancient inhabitants were 
to be scattered abroad, and ere the time come when he 
shall reign in Jerusalem before his ancients gioriously.f 
Annunciations of a future and final restoration almost 
uniformly accompany the curses denounced against the 
land. Arid frequent, and express as words can be, are 
the references throughout the prophecies to the period, 
yet to come, when the children of Israel shall be gathered 
out of all nations, and when the land then, at last and 
for ever, brought back from desolation, and the cities, 
repaired after the desolations of many generations, and the 
mountains of Israel, which have been always waste, shall 
be no more desolate, nor the people termed forsaken any 
more.J After the Messiah was to be cut off, and the 
sacrifice and oblation to cease, the ensuing desolations 
were to reach even to the consummation, and till that de- 
termined shall be poured upon the desolate. $ And Jeru- 
salem, as Jesus hath declared, shall be trodden down of 
the Gentiles, till the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled. j| 

Neither the dispersion of the Jews nor the desolation 
of Judea are to cease, according to the prophecies, till 
other evidence shall thereby be given of prophetic inspi- 
ration. The application to the present period, or to 
modern times, oi the prophecies relative to the desolation 
of Judea, is thus abundantly manifest. And the more 
numerous they are, so much the more severe is the test 
which they abide. And while the Jews are not yet 
gathered from all the nations, nor planted in their own 
land to be no more pulled out of it, 3 ]! — nor its destroyers 
and they that laid it waste gone forth from it ;** nor the 
old waste places built, nor the foundations of many genera- 
tions raised up — nor the land brought back from desola- 
tion ;ft — the effect of every vision is still to be seen, and 
even now, at this late period of the times of the Gentiles, 
though the blessed consummation may not be very distant, 

* Isa. xxxii. 15. t Isa. xxlv. 1, 23. 

X Isa. lxi. 4. Ezek. xxvi. 8, 10 ; xxxvii. 21 ; xxxvih. 8. Isa. lxii. 4. 
$ Dan. ix. 27. I| Luke xxi. 21. IT Amos ix. 14, 15. 

**. Isa. xlix. 17. H lb. lviii. 12. 



7UDEA. 89 

there is abundant evidence to complete the proof that 
that which was determined has been poured upon the 
desolate, and that all the curses that are written in the 
book of the Lord have been brought upon the land.* 

The devastation of Judea is so " astonishing," and its 
poverty as a country so remarkable, that, forgetful of 
the prophecies respecting it, and in the rashness of their 
zeal, infidels once attempted to draw an argument from 
thence against the truth of Christianity, by denying the 
possibility of the existence of so numerous a population 
as can accord with Scriptural history, and by represent- 
ing it as a region singularly unproductive and irre claim- 
able.! But though they have, in some instances at least, 
voluntarily abandoned this indefensible assumption, they 
have left to the believer the fruits of their concession ; 
they have given the most unsuspicious testimony to 
the confirmation of the prophecies, and have served to 
establish the cause which they sought to ruin. The 
evidence of ancient authors — the fertility of the soil 
wherever a single spot can be cultivated — the remains 
of vegetable mould piled by artificial means upon the 
sides of the mountains, which may have clothed them 
with a richer and more frequent harvest than the most 
fertile vale ; and the multitude of the ruins of cities that 

* Deut. xxix. 27. 

t Voltaire, without adducing any authority whatever in support of his asser- 
tion, and without expressly declaring that, in lieu of such evidence, he was 
gifted with an intuitive knowledge of the historical and geographical fact, — 
speaks of the ancient state of Palestine with derision, describes it as one of 
the worst countries of Asia, likens it to Switzerland, and says that it can 
only be esteemed fertile when compared with the desert. (La Palestine 
n'etait que ce qu'elle est aujourd'hui, un des plus mauvais pays de l'Asie. 
Cette petite province, &c. — CEuvres de Voltaire. Ed. A. Gotha, Torn. XVII. 
p. 107.) Without citing, on the other hand, the ample evidence of Josephus 
and of Jerome, both of whom were inhabitants of Judea, and more adequate 
judges of the fact, the following testimony to the great fertility of that 
country, not being chargeable with the partiality which might be attached to 
the opinion either of a Christian or of a Jew, may be given in answer to 
the groundless assertion of Voltaire — testimony which ought to have been 
better known and appreciated even by that high-priest of modern infidelity, 
if the sacrifice of truth on the altar of wit had not been too common an act of 
his devotion to that chief god of his idolatry. Corpora hominum salubria et 
ferentia laborem ; rari imbres, uber solum, fruges nostrum ad morem ; prater- 
que eas balsamum et palmce. Magna pars Judea? vicis dispergitur, ha- 
bent et oppida. Hierosolyma genti caput. Illic immensae opulentiae tern 
plum, et primis munimentis urbs. — Taciti Hist. Lib. V. c. 6, 8. Ultima 
Syriarum est Palestina, per intervalla magna protenta, cultis abundans 
terris et nitidis et civitates habens quasdam egregias, nullam sibi cedentem 
sed sibi vicissim velut ad perpendiculum asmulas. — Ammiani Mar cell. Lib. 
xiv. cap. 8, § 11. Ed. Lips. 1808. Nee sane viris, opibus, armis quicquam 
copiosius Syria. — Flori. Hist. lib. ii. cap. 8, § 4. Syria in hortis operosis- 
eima est. Inde quoque rst proverbium Greecis. Multa Syrorum olera.— Plvni 
Hist. Nat. lib. xx. cap. 5. 

8* 



90 JUDEA. 

now cover the extensive, but uncultivated and desert 
plains, bear witness that there was a numerous and con- 
densed population in a country flowing with food ; and 
that if any history recorded its greatness, or any pro- 
phecies reveaied its desolation, they have both been am- 
ply verified. 

The acknowledgments of Volney, and the description 
which he gives from personal observation, are sufficient 
to confute entirely the gratuitous assumptions and insid- 
ious sarcasms of Voltaire ; and, wonderful as it may ap- 
pear, copious extracts may be drawn from that writer, 
whose unwitting or unwilling testimony is as powerful 
an attestation of the completion of many prophecies, 
when he relates facts of which he was an eyewitness, 
as his untried theories, his ideal perfectibility of human 
nature if released from the restraints of religion, and 
his perverted views both of the nature and effects of 
Christianity, have proved greatly instrumental in sub- 
verting the faith of many, who, unguarded by any positive 
evidence, gave heed to such seductive doctrines. There 
needs not to be any better witness of facts confirmatory 
of the prophecies, and in so far conclusive against all 
his speculations, than Volney himself. Of the natural 
fertility of the country, and of its abounding population 
in ancient times, he gives the most decisive evidence. 
" Syria unites different climates under the same sky, and 
collects within a small compass pleasures and produc- 
tions which nature has elsewhere dispersed at great dis- 
tances of time and places. To this advantage, which 
perpetuates enjoyments by their succession, it adds an- 
other, that of multiplying them by the variety of its pro- 
ductions." " With its numerous advantages of climate 
and soil, it is not astonishing that Syria should always 
have been esteemed a most delicious country, and that 
the Greeks and Romans ranked it among the most 
beautiful of their provinces, and even thought it not in- 
ferior to Egypt."* After having assigned several just 
and sufficient reasons to account for the large population 
of Judea in ancient times, in contradiction to those who 
were skeptical of the fact, he adds, " Admitting only 
what is conformable to experience and nature, there is 
nothing to contradict the great population of high anti- 
quity Without appealing to the positive testimony of 

* Volney's Travels in Egvpt and Syria. Eng Trans. Land. iTbT, vol. i. pp 
SI6, 321. 



JUDEA. 91 

history, there are innumerable monuments which depose 
in favour of the fact. Such are the prodigious quantity 
of ruins dispersed over the plains, and even in the moun- 
tains, at this day deserted. On the remote parts of Car- 
mel are found wild vines and olive-trees which must have 
been conveyed thither by the hand of man ; and in the 
Lebanon of the Druses and Maronites, the rocks, now 
abandoned to fir-trees and brambles, present us in a 
thousand places with terraces, which prove that they 
were anciently better cultivated, and consequently much 
more populous, than in our days.' 5 * 

" Syria," says Gibbon, " one of the countries that have 
been improved by the most early cultivation, is not un- 
worthy of the preference. The heat of the climate is 
tempered by the vicinity of the sea and mountains, — by 
the plenty of wood and water ; and the produce of a 
fertile soil affords the subsistence and encourages the 
propagation of men and animals. From the age of Da- 
vid to that of Heraciius the country was overspread 
with ancient and flourishing cities ; the inhabitants were 
numerous and wealthy." Such evidence has merely 
been selected as the most unsuspicious, though that of 
many others might also be adduced. The country in the 
immediate vicinity of Jerusalem is indeed rocky, as 
Strabo represents it, and apparently sterile ; and is now, 
in general, perfectly barren ; but " even the sides of the 
most barren mountains in the neighbourhood of Jerusa- 
lem had been rendered fertile by being divided into ter- 
races, like steps rising one above another, where soil 
has been accumulated with astonishing labour."! " In 
any part of Judea," Dr. Clarke adds, " the effects of a 
beneficial change of government are soon witnessed, in 
the conversion of desolated plains into fertile fields. 
Under a wise and beneficent government the produce 
of the Holy Land would exceed all calculation. Its 
perennial harvest, the salubrity of its air, its limpid 
springs, its rivers, lakes, and matchless plains, its hills 
and vales, — all these, added to the serenity of the climate, 
prove this to be indeed a field which the Lord hath 
blessed."'! But the facts of the former fertility, as well 
as of the present desolation of Judea are established 
beyond contradiction ; and, in attempting, in this respect, 

* Volney's Travels in Egypt and Syria, vol. ii. p. 368. 

t Clarke's Travels, vol. ii. p. 520. General Straton describes these terraces 
as resembling the gradus of a theatre; and particularly marked tbem as ves- 
tiges of ancient " luxuriance." j Ibid. p. 521. 



92 JUDEA. 

to invalidate the truth of sacred history, infidels have 
either been driven, or have reluctantly retired, from the 
defenceless ground which they themselves had once as- 
sumed, and have given room whereon to rest an argu- 
ment against their want of faith as well as of veracity. 
For, in conclusion of this matter, it surely may, without 
any infringement of truth or of justice, be remarked, that 
the extent of the present and long-fixed desolation, the 
very allegation on which they would discredit the Scrip- 
tural narrative of the ancient glory of Judea, being itself a 
clearly-predicted truth, then the greater the difficulty of 
reconciling the knowledge of what it was to the fact 
of what it is, and the greater the difficulty of believing 
the possibility of so " astonishing" a contrast, the more 
wonderful are the prophecies which revealed it all, the 
more completely are they accredited as a voice from 
heaven, and the argument of the infidel leads the more 
directly to proof against himself. Such is " the positive 
testimony of history," and such the subsisting proofs of 
the former grandeur and fertility of Palestine, that we are 
now left without a cavil to the calm investigation of the 
change in that country from one extreme to another, 
and of the consonance of that change with the dictates 
of prophecy. 

Under any regular and permanent government, a re- 
gion so favoured by climate, so diversified in surface, so 
rich in soil, and which had been so luxuriant for ages, 
would naturally have resumed its opulence and power ; 
and its permanent desolation, alike contradictory to 
every suggestion of experience and of reason, must 
have been altogether inconceivable by man. But the 
land ivas to be overthroivn by strangers, to be trodden down, 
mischief was to come upon mischief, and destruction upon 
destruction, and the land ivas to be desolate. The Chal- 
deans devastated Judea, and led the inhabitants into tem- 
porary captivity. The kings of Syria and Egypt, by their 
extortions and oppression, impoverished the country; 
the Romans held it long in subjection to their iron yoke ; 
and the Persians contended for the possession of it. But 
in succeeding ages still greater destroyers than any of the 
former appeared upon the scene to perfect the work of de- 
vastation. " In the year 622 (636), the Arabian tribes, col- 
lected under the banners of Mahomet,*seized, or rather laid 
it waste. Since that period, torn to pieces by the civil 
wars of the Fatimites and the Ommiades ; wrested from 
the califs by their rebellious governors ; taken from them 



JUDEA. 93 

by the Turkmen soldiery ; invaded by the European cru- 
saders ; retaken by the Mamelouks of Egypt ; and rav- 
aged by Tamerlane and his Tartars — it has at length 
fallen into the hands of the Ottoman Turks."* It has 
been overthrown by strangers, — trodden under foot, — de- 
struction has come upon destruction. 

The cities were to be laid waste. By the concurring 
testimony of all travellers, Judea may now be called a 
field of ruins. Columns, the memorials of ancient mag- 
nificence, now covered with rubbish, and buried under 
ruins, may be found in all Syria, f From Mount Tabor 
is beheld an immensity of plains, interspersed with ham- 
lets, fortresses, and heaps of ruins. The buildings on 
that mountain were destroyed and laid waste by the 
Sultan of Egypt in 1290, and the accumulated vestiges 
of successive forts and ruins are now mingled in one 
common and extensive desolation.^ Of the celebrated 
cities Capernaum, Bethsaida, Gadara, Tarichea, and 
Chorazin, nothing remains but shapeless ruins. ^ Some 
vestiges of Emmaus may still be seen. Cana is a very 
paltry village. The ruins of Tekoa present only the 
foundations of some considerable buildings. || The city 
of Nairn is now a hamlet. The ruins of the ancient 
Sapphura announce the previous existence of a large 
city, and its name is still preserved in the appellation 
of a miserable village called Sephoury.^jf Loudd, the 
ancient Lydda and Diospolis, appears like a place lately 
ravaged by fire and sword, and is one continued heap 
of rubbish and ruins.** Ramla, the ancient Arimathea, 
is in almost as ruinous a state. Nothing but rubbish is 
to be found within its boundaries. In the adjacent 
country there are found at every step dry wells, cisterns 
fallen in, and vast vaulted reservoirs, which prove that in 
ancient times this town must have been upwards of a 
league and a half in circumference. ff Caesarea can no 
longer excite the envy of a conqueror, and has long been 
abandoned to silent desolation. %% The city of Tiberias is 
now almost abandoned, and its subsistence precarious ; of 
the towns that bordered on its lake there are no traces left. W 

* Volney's Travels, vol. i. p. 357. t Mariti's Travels, vol. ii. p. 141.- 

% Buckingham's Travels in Palestine, p. 107. Mariti's Travels, vol. ii. p. 177. 

§ lb. Wilson's Travels, p. 227. 

1) Maemichael's.Journey to Constantinople, p. 196. 

IT Clarke's Travels, vol. ii. p: 401. 

** Volney's Travels, vol. ii. p. 332-334. ft Ibid. p. 334. 

XX Captain Light's Travels, p: 204. Buckingham's Travels, p. 128. 

%.§ Captain Light's Travels p 294. 



94 JUBEA. 

Zabulon, once 1he rival of Tyre and Sidon, is a heap of 
ruins. A few shapeless stones, unworthy the attention 
of the traveller, mark the site of the Satire.* The 
ruins of Jericho, covering no less than a square mile, are 
surrounded with complete desolation ; and there is not 
a tree of any description, either of palm or balsam, and 
scarcely any verdure or bushes to be seen about the site 
of this abandoned city.f Bethel is not to be found. 
The ruins of Sarepta, and of several large cities in its 
vicinity, are now " mere rubbish, and are only distin- 
guishable as the sites of towns by heaps of dilapidated 
stories and fragments of columns."J But at Djerash 
(supposed to be the ruins of Gerasa) are the magnificent 
remains of a splendid city. The form of streets, once 
lined with a double row of columns and covered with 
pavement still nearly entire, in which are the marks of 
the chariot-wheels, and on each side of which is an ele- 
vated pathway — two theatres and two grand temples, 
built of marble," and others of inferior note — baths — 
bridges — a cemetery with many sarcophagi, which sur- 
rounded the city — a triumphal arch — a large cistern — a 
picturesque tomb fronted with columns, and an aque- 
duct overgrown with wood — and upwards of two hun- 
dred and thirty columns still standing amid deserted 
ruins, without a city to adorn — all combine in presenting 
to the view of the traveller, in the estimation of those 
who were successively eyewitnesses of them both, " a 
much finer mass of ruins" than even that of the boasted 
Palmyra.^ But how marvellously are the predictions 
of their desolation verified, when in general nothing but 
ruined ruins form the most distinguished remnants of the 
cities of Israel ; and when the multitude of its towns are 
almost all left, with many a vestige to testify of their 
number, but without a mark to tell their name. 

And your land shall be desolate, and your cities waste. 
Then shall the land enjoy her Sabbaths as long as it lieth 
desolate, and ye be in your enemies' land ; even then shall the 

* Mariti's Travels, vol. ii. p. 158-169. t Buckingham's Travels, p. 300. 

X Captains Irby and Mangies's Travels, p. 199. 

§ Irby and Mangies's Travels, p. 317, 31S. : 

The ruins of Djerash were first discovered by Seetzen,in 1806. They have 
since been visited by Sheikh Ibrahim (Burckhardt), Sir William Chatterton, 
Mr. Bankes, the Hon. Captain Irby, Captain Mangles, Mr. Legh, Mr. Leslie, 
and Mr. Buckingham. Both Burckhardt and Mr. Buckingham have also given 
a description of them. Many of the edifices were built long after the period 
of the prediction ; yet they are not excluded from the sentence of desolation.. 



JUDEA. 95 

land rest and enjoy her Sabbaths, Sic. A single reference 
to the Mosaic law respecting the Sabbatical vear renders 
the full purport of this prediction perfectly intelligible 
and obvious. " But in the seventh year shall be a Sab- 
bath of rest unto the land, thou shalt neither sow thy field 
nor prune thy vineyard." And the land of Judea hath 
even thus enjoyed its Sabbaths so long as it hath lain 
desolate. In that country, where every spot was culti- 
vated like a garden by its patrimonial possessor, where 
every little hill rejoiced in its abundance, where every 
steep acclivity was terraced by the labour of man, and 
where the very rocks were covered thick with mould, 
and rendered fertile ; even in that selfsame land, with a 
climate the same,* and with a soil unchanged, save only 
by neglect, a dire contrast is now, and has for a length- 
ened period of time been displayed by fields untitled and 
unsown, and by waste and desolated plains. Never since 
the expatriated descendants of Abraham were driven 
from its borders has the land of Canaan been so "plen- 
teous in goods," or so abundant in population, as once it 
was ; never, as it did for ages unto them, has it vindicated 
to any other people a right to its possession, or its own 
title of the land of promise — it has rested from century 
to century; and while that marked, and stricken, and 
scattered race, who possess the recorded promise of the 
God of Israel, as their charter to its final and everlasting 
possession, still " be in the land of their enemies, so long 
their land lieth desolate." There may thus almost be said 
to be the semblance of a sympathetic feeling between 
this bereaved country and banished people, as if the land 
of Israel felt the miseries of its absent children, awaited 
their return, and responded to the undying love they bear 
it by the refusal to yield to other possessors the rich 
harvest of those fruits, with which, in the days of their 
allegiance to the Most High, it abundantly blessed them. 
And striking and peculiar, without the shadow of even a 
semblance upon earth, as is this accordance between the 
fate of Judea and of the Jews, it assimilates as closely, 
and, may we not add, as miraculously, to those predic- 
tions respecting both, which Moses uttered and recorded 
ere the tribes of Israel had ever set a foot in Canaan. 
The land shall be left of them, and shall enjoy her rest ivkile 
she lieth desolate without them. 

* See Brewster's Philosophical Journal, No. XVI. p. 227. 



98 JUDEA. 

To the desc late state of Judea every traveller bears 
witness. The prophetic malediction was addressed to 
the mountains and to the hills, to the rivers and to the 
valleys ; and the beauty of them ail has been blighted. 
Where the inhabitants once dwelt in peace, each under 
his own vine and under his own fig-tree, the tyranny of 
the Turks, and the perpetual incursions of the Arabs, the 
last of a long list of oppressors, have spread one wide 
field of almost unmingled desolation. The plain of Es- 
draelon, naturally most fertile, its soil consisting of " fine 
rich black mould," level like a lake, except where Mount 
Ephraim rises in its centre, bounded by Mount Hermon, 
Carmel, and Mount Tabor,* and so extensive as to cover 
about three hundred square miles, is a solitudef " almost 
entirely deserted ; the country is a complete desert."J 
Even the vale of Sharon is a waste. In the valley of 
Canaan, formerly a beautiful, delicious, and fertile valley, 
there is not a mark or vestige of cultivation. § The 
country is continually overrun with rebel tribes ; the 
Arabs pasture their cattle upon the spontaneous produce 
of the rich plains with which it abounds. || Every ancient 
landmark is removed. Law there is none. Lives and 
property are alike unprotected. The valleys are untilled, 
the mountains have lost their verdure, the rivers flow 
through a desert and cheerless land. AH the beauty of 
Tabor that man could disfigure is defaced; immense 
ruins on the top of it are now the only remains of a 
once magnificent city : and Carmel is the habitation of 
wild beasts.^f " The art of cultivation," says Volney, 
"is in the most deplorable state, and the countryman 
must sow with the musket in his hand ; and no more is 
sown than is necessary for subsistence." " Every day I 
found fields abandoned by the plough."** In describing 
his journey through Galilee, Dr. Clarke remarks, that 
the earth was covered with such a variety of thistles, 
that a complete collection of them would be a valuable 
acquisition to botany. ff Six new species of that plant, 
so significant of wildness, were discovered by himself in 

* General Straton's MS. Travels. 

+ Clarke's Travels, vol. ii. p. 497. Maundrell's Travels, p. 95. 

t Burckhardt's Travels in Syria, p. 334, 342. 

§ General Straton's MS. 

|1 Clarke's Travels, vol. ii. p. 484, 491. 

If Mariti, vol. ii. p. 140. 

** Volney's Travels, vol. ii. p. 413. Volney 's Ruins, c. 11. p. 7. 

tt Travels, vol. ii. p. 451. 



JUDEA. 97 

a scanty selection. " From Kane-Leban to Beer, amid 
the ruins of cities, the country, as far as the eye of the 
traveller can reach, presents nothing to his view but 
naked rocks, mountains, and precipices, at the sight of 
which pilgrims are astonished, balked in their expecta- 
tions, and almost startled in their faith."* " From the 
centre of the neighbouring elevations (around Jerusalem) 
is seen a wild, rugged, and mountainous desert ; no herds 
depasturing on the summit, no forests clothing the ac- 
clivities, no waters flowing through the valleys ; but one 
rude scene of savage melancholy waste, in the midst of 
which the ancient glory of Judea bows her head in 
widowed desolation."f It is needless to multiply quota- 
tions to prove the desolation of a country which the 
Turks have possessed, and which the Arabs have plun- 
dered for ages. Enough has been said to prove that the 
land mourns and is laid waste, and has become as a desolate 
wilderness. 

But yet in it shall be a tenth, and it shall return and shall 
be eaten : as a teil-tree and an oak tvhose substance is in them 
when they cast their leaves. Though the cities be waste, 
and the land be desolate, it is not from the poverty of the 
soil that the fields are abandoned by the plough, nor from 
any diminution of its ancient and natural fertility that the 
land has rested for so many generations. Judea was not 
forced only by artificial means, or from local and tem- 
porary causes, into a luxuriant cultivation, such as a 
barren country might have been, concerning which it 
would not have needed a prophet to tell, that if once 
devastated and abandoned it would ultimately and per- 
manently revert into its original sterility. Phenicia at 
all times held a far different rank among the richest coun- 
tries of the world : and it was not a bleak and sterile 
portion of the earth, nor a land which even many ages 
of desolation and neglect could impoverish, that God 
gave in possession and by covenant to the seed of Abra- 
ham. No longer cultivated as a garden, but left like a 
wilderness, Judea is indeed greatly changed from what 
it was ; all that human ingenuity and labour did devise^ 
erect, or cultivate, men have laid waste and desolate ; 
all the " plenteous goods" with which it was enriched, 
adorned, and blessed, have fallen like seared and withered 



* Maundrell's Travels, p. 188. 

(• Joliffe's Letters from Palestine, vol. i. p. 104. 

E 



88 JUDEA. 

leaves, when their greenness is gone ; and, stripped of 
its " ancient splendour," it is left as an oak whose leaf 
fadeth : — but its inherent sources of fertility are not dried 
up ; the natural richness of the s<rl is unblighted ; the 
substance is in it, strong as that of the teil-tree or the 
solid oak, which retain their substance when they cast 
their leaves. — And as the leafless oak waits, throughout 
winter, for the genial warmth of returning spring, to be 
clothed with renewed foilage, so the once glorious land 
of Judea is yet full of latent vigour, or of vegetative 
power strong as ever, ready to shoot forth, even " better 
than at the beginning," whenever the sun of heaven shall 
shine on it again, and the " holy seed" be prepared for 
being finally " the substance thereof." — The substance 
that is in it — which alone has here to be proved — is, in 
few words, thus described by an enemy. " The land in 
the plains is fat and loamy, and exhibits every sign of the 
greatest fecundity" — " Were nature assisted by art, the 
fruits of the most distant countries might be produced 
within the distance of twenty leagues." " Galilee,"* 
says Malte Brun, " would be a paradise, were it inhab- 
ited by an industrious people, under an enlightened 
government. Vine stocks are to be seen here a foot and 
a half in diameter."! 

I will give it into the hands of strangers for a prey, and 
unto the wicked of the earth for a spoil. The robbers shall 
enter into it and defile it. Instead of abiding under a set- 
tled and enlightened government, Judea has been the 
scene of frequent invasions, " which have introduced a 
succession of foreign nations (des peuples etrangers)."% 
" When the Ottomans took Syria from the Mamelouks, 
they considered it as the spoil of a vanquished enemy. 
According to this law, the life and property of the van- 
quished belong to the conqueror. The government is 
far from disapproving of a system of robbery and plunder 
which it finds so profitable. "§ 

Many pastors have destroyed my vineyard, they have 
trodden my portion under foot. The ravages committed 
even by hosts of enemies are in general only temporary : 
or if an invader settle in a conquered country, on be- 
coming the possessor, he cultivates and defends it. And 
it is the proper office of government to render life and 

* Volney's Travels, i. p. 308, 317. 

t Schulze, in Pallas, cited by Malte Brun, Geog.-vol. ii. p. 148. 

J Volney's Travels, i. p. 356. § lb. toI. ii. p. 370, 381. 



3UDEA. 99 

property secure. In neither case has it fared thus with 
Judea. But besides successive invasions by foreign 
nations, and the systematic spoliation exercised by a des- 
potic government, other causes have conspired to per- 
petuate its desolation, and to render abortive the sub- 
stance that is in it. Among these has chiefly to be num- 
bered its being literally trodden underfoot by many pas- 
tors. Volney devotes a chapter, fifty pages in length, to 
a description, as he entitles it, " Of the pastoral, or wan- 
dering tribes of Syria," chiefly of the Bedouin Arabs, by 
whom especially Judea is incessantly traversed. " The 
pachalics of Aleppo and Damascus may be computed to 
contain about thirty thousand wandering Turkmen (Tur- 
komans). All their property consists in cattle." In the 
same pachalics, the number of the Curds " exceed twenty 
thousand tents and huts," or an equal number of armed 
men. " The Curds are almost everywhere looked upon 
as robbers. Like the Turkmen, these Curds are pastors 
and wanderers.* A third wandering people in Syria are 
the Bedouin Arabs. "f " It often happens that even in- 
dividuals turn robbers, in order to withdraw themselves 
from the laws, or from tyranny, unite and form a little 
camp, which maintain themselves by arms, and, increas- 
ing, become new hordes and new tribes. We may pro- 
nounce, that in cultivable countries the wandering life 
originates in the injustice or want of policy of the gov- 
ernment; and that the sedentary and the cultivating 
state is that to which mankind is most naturally in- 
clined."! " It is evident that agriculture must be very 
precarious in such a country, and that, under a govern- 
ment like that of the Turks, it is safer to lead a wander- 
ing life than to choose a settled habitation, and rely for 
subsistence on agriculture. "§ " The Turkmen, the Curds, 
and the Bedouins have no fixed habitations, but keep per- 
petually wandering with their tents and herds, in limited 
districts of which they look upon themselves as the pro- 
prietors. The Arabs spread over the whole frontier of 
Syria, and even the plains of Palestine."|| — Thus, con- 
trary to their natural inclination, the peasants, often 
forced to abandon a settled life, and pastoral tribes in 
great numbers, or many, and without fixed habitations, 
divide the country, as it were, by mutual consent, and 
apportion it in limited districts among themselves by an 

* Volney's Travels, i. 370, 1, 4, 5. t Ibid. i. p. 377. 

; Ibid. p. 333. <, Ibid. p. 337. H Ibid. p. 367, 358. 

E2 



100 JUDEA. 

assumed right of property, and the Arabs, subdivided 
also into different tribes, spread over the plains of Pales- 
tine, " wandering perpetually," as if on very purpose to 
tread it down. — What could be more unlikely or unnatu- 
ral in such a land ! yet what more strikingly and strictly 
true ! or how else could the effect of the vision have 
been seen ! Many pastors, have destroyed my vineyard 
they have trodden my portion underfoot. 

Ye shall be as a garden that hath no water. How long 
shall the land mourn and the herbs of every field wither, for 
the wickedness of them that dwell therein. " In all hot coun- 
tries, wherever there is water, vegetation may be per- 
petually maintained and made to produce an uninter- 
rupted succession of fruits to flowers, and flowers to 
fruits."* " The remains of cisterns are to be found 
(throughout Judea), in which they collected the rain- 
water ; and traces of the canals by which those waters 
were distributed on the fields. — These labours necessarily 
created a prodigious fertility under an ardent sun, where 
a little water was the only requisite to revive the vege- 
table world."! Such labours, with very slight excep- 
tions, are now unknown. Judea is as a garden that hath 
no water, and the herbs of every field wither. "We see 
there none of that gay carpeting of grass and flowers which 
decorate the meadows of Normandy and Flanders, nor 
those clumps of beautiful trees which give such richness 
and animation to the landscapes of Burgundy and Brit- 
tany. — The land of Syria has almost always a dusty ap- 
pearance. X Had not these countries been ravaged by the 
hand of man, they might perhaps at this day have been 
shaded with forests. That its productions do not corres- 
pond with its natural advantages is less owing to its 
physical than political state. "§ " The whole of the 
mountain (near Tiberias) is covered with dry grass."|| 

The forts and towers shall be for dens for ever. "At 
every step we meet with ruins of towers, dungeons, and 
castles with fosses — frequently inhabited by jackals, owls, 
and scorpions."^ 

The multitude of the city shall be left. The defenced city 
shall be desolate, and the habitation forsaken. There are 
a " prodigious quantity of ruins dispersed over the plains, 
and even in the mountains, at this day deserted."** 

* Volney's Travels, ii. 359. t Malte Brun's Geog. ii. 150, 151. 

% Volney's Travels, ii. p. 359. § Ibid. p. 359, 360. 

|i Burckhardt's Travels, p. 331. ir Volnev'a Travels, ii. p. 336. 
** Ibid. p. 36& 



JUDEA. 101 

There shall the calf feed, and there shall he lie down, and 
consume the branches thereof. A pasture of flocks. There 
shall the lambs feed after their manner, and the waste places 
of the fat ones shall strangers eat. Josephus describes 
Galilee, of which he was the governor, as "full of 
plantations of trees of all sorts, the soil universally rich 
and fruitful, and all, without the exception of a single 
part, cultivated by the inhabitants. Moreover," he adds, 
" the cities lie here very thick, and there are very many 
villages, which are so full of people, by the richness of 
their soil, that the very least of them contained above 
fifteen thousand inhabitants."* Such was Galilee, at the 
commencement of the Christian era, several centuries 
after the prophecy was delivered; but now "the plain 
of Esdraelon, and all the other parts of Galilee which 
afford pasture, are occupied by Arab tribes, around whose 
brown tents the sheep and lambs gambol to the sound of 
the reed, which at nightfall calls them home."f The 
calf feeds and lies down amid the ruins of the cities, and 
consumes, without hinderance, the branches of the trees ; 
and, however changed may be the condition of the in- 
habitants, the lambs feed after their manner, and, while the 
land mourns, and the merry-hearted sigh, they gambol 
to the sound of the reed. 

The precise and complete contrast between the an- 
cient and existing state of Palestine, as separately de- 
scribed by Jewish and Roman historians and by modern 
travellers, is so strikingly exemplified in their opposite 
descriptions, that, in reference to whatever constituted 
the beauty and the glory of the country, or the happi- 
ness of the people, an entire change is manifest, even in 
minute circumstances. The universal richness and fruit- 
fulness of the soil of Galilee, together with its being 
" full of plantations of all sorts of trees," are represented 
by Josephus as " inviting the most slothful to take pains 
in its cultivation." And the other provinces of the Holy 
Land are also described by him as " having abundance 
of trees, full of autumnal fruit, both that which grows 
wild, and that which is the effect of cultivation. "J Taci- 
tus relates, that, besides all the fruits of Italy, the palm 
and balsam-tree flourished in the fertile soil of Judea. 
And he records the great carefulness with which, when 

* Josephus' Wars, book iii. chap. 3, sect. 2. 
t Schulze, quoted by Malte Brun, vol. ii. p. 148. 
X Josephus' Wars, book iii chap. 3, sect. 2. 
9* 



lOt JUDEA. 

the circulation of the juices seemed to call for it, they 
gently made an incision in the branches of the balsam, 
with a shell, or pointed stone, not venturing to apply a 
knife. No sign of such art or care is now to be seen 
throughout the land. The balm-tree has disappeared 
where long it flourished : and hardier plants have per- 
ished from other causes than the want of due care m 
their cultivation. And instead of relating how the growth 
of a delicate tree is promoted, and the medicinal liquor 
at the same time extracted from its branches, by a nicety 
or perfectibility of art worthy of the notice of a Tacitus, 
a different task has fallen to the lot of the traveller from 
a far land, who describes the customs of those who now 
dwell where such arts were practised. " The olive- 
trees (near Arimathea) are daily perishing through age, 
the ravages of contending factions, and even from secret 
mischief. The Mamelouks having cut down all the olive- 
trees, for the pleasure they take in destroying, or to 
make yzres, Yafa has lost its greatest convenience."* In- 
stead of " abundance of trees" being still the effect of 
cultivation, such, on the other hand, has been the effect 
of these ravages, that many places in Palestine are now 
" absolutely destitute of fuel." Yet in this devastation, 
and in all its progress, may be read the literal fulfilment 
of the prophecy, which not only described the desolate 
cities of Judea as a pasture of flocks, and as places for 
the calf to feed and lie down, and consume the branches 
thereof; but which, with equal truth, also declared, when 
the boughs thereof are ivithered, they shall be broken off; 
the ivomen come and set them on fire. 

For it is a people of no understanding. " The most 
simple arts are in a state of barbarism. The sciences 
are totally unknown."f 

Upon the land of my people shall come up thorns and 
briers. "The earth produces (only) briers and worm- 
wood.":); A thorny shrub (merar), and others of a similar 
kind, abound throughout the desolated plains and hills of 
Palestine. Some of the latter are so closely beset in 
many places with thorns, that they can be ascended only 
with great difficulty ; and " the whole district of Tiberias 
*s covered with a thorny shrub. "§ 

Your highways shall be desolate.\\ The highways lie 

* Volney's Travels, vol. ii. p. 332, 333. T Ibid. vol. ii. p. 442. 

t Volney's Ruins, p. 9. 

$ Burckhardt's Travels in Syria, p. 333. || Lev. xxvi. 22. 



JUDEA. 103 

waste; the wayfaring man ceaseth. So great must have 
been the intercourse, in ancient times, between the 
populous and numerous cities of Judea, and so much 
must that intercourse have been increased by the fre- 
quent and regular journeyings from every quarter of 
multitudes going up to Jerusalem to worship, in ob- 
servance of the rites, and in obedience to the precepts 
of their law, that scarcely any country ever possessed 
such means of crowded highways, or any similar reason 
for abounding so much in wayfaring men, In the days 
of Isaiah, who uttered the latest of these predictions, 
" the land was full of horses, neither was there any end 
of their chariots."* And there not only subsist to this 
day in the land of Judea numerous remains of paved 
ways formed by the Romans at a much later period, and 
" others evidently not Roman ;"f but among the pre- 
cious literary remains of antiquity which have come 
down to our times, three Roman itineraries are to be 
numbered, that can here be confidently appealed to. 
From these, and from the testimony of Arrian and Dio- 
dorus Siculus, as well as of Josephus and Eusebius, it 
appears, as Reland has clearly shown, that in Palestine, 
long after it came under the power of the Romans, and 
after it was greatly debased from its ancient glory, there 
were forty-two different highways (viae publican), all 
being distinctly specified, which intersected it in various 
directions ; and the number of miles exceeding eight 
hundred and eighty.J Yet the prophecy is literally true. 
" In the interior part of the country there are neither 
great roads, nor canals, nor even bridges over the greatest 
part of the rivers and torrents, however necessary they 
may be in winter. Between town and town there are 
neither post nor public conveyances. Nobody travels 
alone, from the insecurity of the roads. One must wait 
for several travellers who are going to the same place, 
or take advantage of the passage of some great man, 
who assumes the office of protector, but is more fre- 
quently the oppressor, of the caravan. The roads in the 
mountains are extremely bad ; and the inhabitants are 
so far from levelling them, that they endeavour to make 
them more rugged, in order, as they say, to cure the 
Turks of their desire to introduce their cavalry. It is 

* Isaiah xxxiii. 8. | General Straton's MS. 

% Relandi Palestina ex monumentis veteribus illustrata. Tom. i. lib. ii. cap. 
3, 4, 5. p. 405, 425. 



104 JUDEA 

remarkable that there is not a wagon nor a cart in all 
Syria."* "There are," continues Volney, "no inns 
anywhere. The lodgings in the khans (or places of 
reception for travellers) are cells where you find nothing 
but bare walls, dust, and sometimes scorpions. The 
keeper of the khan gives the traveller the key and the 
mat, and he provides himself the rest. He must there- 
fore carry with him his bed, his kitchen utensils, and 
even his provisions ; for frequently not even bread is to 
be found in the villages."! " There are no carriages in 
the country," says another traveller, "under any de- 
nomination." " Among the hills of Palestine,"! accord- 
ing to a third witness, " the road is impassable ; and the 
traveller finds himself among a set of infamous and igno- 
rant thieves, who would cut his throat for a farthing, and 
rob him of his money for the mere pleasure of doing it."§ 
In a country where there is a total want of wheel car- 
riages of every description, the highways, however ex- 
cellent and numerous they once might have been, must 
lie waste ; and where such dangers have to be encoun- 
tered at every step, and such privations at every stage, 
it is not now to be wondered that the wayfaring man 
ceaseth. But let the disciples of Volney tell by what 
dictates of human wisdom the whole of his description 
of these existing facts was summed up, in a brief sen- 
tence, by Moses and Isaiah ; by the former thirty-three, 
and by the latter twenty-five centuries past. \ 

The spoilers shall come upon all high places through the 
wilderness. " These precautions are above all necessary 
in the countries exposed to the Arabs, such as Palestine, 
and the whole frontier of the desert."|| 

The inhabitants of Jerusalem and of the land of Israel 
shall eat their bread with carefulness, and drink their water 
with astonishment, that her land may be desolate from all 
that is therein, because of the violence of all them that dwell 
therein. " In the great cities" (in Syria, none of which 
are in the Holy Land) " the people have much of that 
dissipated and careless air which they usually have with 
us, because there, as well as here," says Volney, alluding 
to France, " inured to suffering from habit, and devoid of; 
reflection from ignorance, they enjoy a kind of security. 
Having nothing to lose, they are in no dread of being 

* Volney's Travels, vol. ii. p. 417, 419. f Ibid. vol. ii. p. 417, 418, 419. 

% Wilson's Travels, p. 100. $ Richardson's Travels, vol. ii. p. 225w 

U Volney's Travels, vol. ii, p. 417. 



JUDEA. 105 

plundered. The merchant, on the contrary, lives in a 
state of perpetual alarm, under the double apprehension 
of acquiring no more, and losing what he possesses. He 
trembles lest he should attract the attention of rapacious 
authority, which would consider an air of satisfaction as 
a proof of opulence and the signal for extortion. The 
same dread prevails throughout the villages, wiiere every 
peasant is afraid of exciting the envy of his equals, and 
the avarice of the aga and his soldiers. In such a 
country, where the subject is perpetually w T atched by a 
despoiling government, he must assume a serious coun- 
tenance for the same reason that he wears ragged 
clothes;"* or, as the description might appropriately 
have been concluded, in the very w^ords of the prophet, 
because of the violence of them that dwell therein. 

They shall be ashamed of your revenues, " From the 
state of the contributions of each pachalic, it appears 
that the annual sum paid by Syria into the kasna, or 
treasury of the suitai? amounts to 2345 purses, viz. 
For Aleppo .... 800 purses, 

Tripoli . . ^50 

Damascus 45 

Acre . . 750 

Palestine — 

2345 purses : 
which are equal to 2,931,250 hvres, or 122,135/. ster- 
ling." After the specification of some identical sources 
of revenue, it is added, " we cannot be far from the truth, 
if we compute the total of the sultan's revenue from 
Syria to be 7,500,000 livres" (312,500Z. sterling),! or less 
than the third part of one million sterling, and less than 
a seventh part of what it yielded, in tribute, unto Egypt, 
long after the prophecies were sealed. This is the 
whole amount that a government which has reached the 
acme of despotism, and which accounts pillage a right, 
and all property its own, can extort from impoverished 
Syria. But insignificant as this sum is, as the revenues 
of those extensive territories, which included in ancient 
times several opulent and powerful states, the greater 
part must be deducted from it, before estimating the 
pitiful pittance, which, under the name of revenue, its 
oppressive masters can now drain from the land of 

* Volney's Travels, vol. ii, p. 477, 478. t Had- vol. ii, p. 360. 



108 JUDEA. 

Israel. A single glance at the preceding statement 
affords the obvious means of distinguishing the compara* 
tive desolation and poverty of the different provinces of 
Syria. And the least unproductive of these in revenue, 
— the pachalics of Aleppo and Tripoli, and a considerable 
portion of what now forms the pachalic of Acre, — were 
not included within the boundaries of ancient Judea. 
Palestine, — containing the ancient territory of Philistia 
and part of Judea, — was then gifted in whole, by the 
sultan, to two individuals. The very extensive pachalic 
of Damascus, so unproductive of revenue, includes Jeru- 
salem and a great proportion of ancient Judea, so that 
of it, even with greater propriety than of the rest, it may 
be said, They shall be ashamed of your revenues. 

Instead of viewing separately each special prediction, 
the prophecies respecting the desolation of the land of 
Judea are so abundant, that several may be grouped 
together; and their meaning is so clear that any ex- 
planatory remarks would be superfluous. Nor is the 
evidence of their complete fulfilment indistinct, or diffi- 
cult to be found ; for Volney illustrates six predictions 
in a single sentence, to which he subjoins a reflection, 
not less confirmatory than them ail of prophetic inspi- 
ration. 

/ will destroy your high places, and bring your sanctua- 
ries into desolation. — The palaces shall be forsaken. — I 
ivill destroy the remnant of the seacoast. — / will make your 
cities ivaste. — The multitude of the city shall be left, the 
habitation forsaken, &c. — The land shall be utterly spoiled, 
— 2" will make the land more desolate than the wilderness. 
" The temples are thrown down — the palaces demolished 
— the ports filled up— the towns destroyed — and the earth, 
stripped of inhabitants, seems a dreary burying-place."* 

" Good God !" exclaims Volney, " from whence pro- 
ceed such melancholy revolutions ? For what cause is 
the fortune of these countries so strikingly changed? 
Why are so many cities destroyed ? Why is not that 
ancient population reproduced and perpetuated? 7 ' — "I 
wandered over the country — I traversed the provinces — 
I enumerated the kingdoms of Damascus and Idumea, 
of Jerusalem and Samaria. This Syria, said / to myself, 
now almost depopulated, then contained a hundred flour- 
ishing cities, and abounded with towns, villages, and 

* Volney 's Ruini, c. 11, p. 8 



JUDEA. 107 

hamlets. What are become of so many productions of 
the hands of man? What are. become of those ages of 
abundance and of life ]" &c. Seeking to be wise, men be- 
come fools when they trust to their own vain imagina- 
tions, and will not look to that word of God which is as 
able to confound the wise, as to give understanding to 
the simple. These words, from the lips of a great ad- 
vocate of infidelity, proclaim the certainty of the truth 
which he was too blind or bigoted to see. For not more 
unintentionally or unconsciously do many illiterate Arab 
pastors or herdsmen verify one prediction, while they 
literally tread Palestine underfoot, than Volney, the aca- 
demician, himself verifies another, while, speaking in his 
own name, and the spokesman also of others, he thus 
confirms the unerring truth of God's holy word, by what 
he said — as well as by describing what he saw. " The 
generation to come of your children that shall rise up after 
you, and the stranger that shall come from a far land 
shall say, when they see the plagues of that land, and the 
sicknesses which the Lord hath laid upon it, Wherefore hath 
the Lord done this unto the land 1 what meaneth the heat of 
this great anger ?" 

It is no " secret malediction," spoken of by Volney, 
which God has pronounced against Judea. It is the 
curse of a broken covenant that rests upon the land— 
the consequences of the iniquities of the people, not of 
those only who have been plucked from off it and scat- 
tered throughout the world, but of those also that dwell 
therein. The ruins of empires originated, not from the 
regard which mortals paid to revealed religion, but from 
causes diametrically the reverse. The desolations are 
not of Divine appointment, but only as they have followed 
the violations of the laws of God, or have arisen from 
thence. And none other curses have come upon the 
land than those that are written in the Book. The char- 
acter and condition of the people are not less definitely 
marked than the features of the land that has been 
smitten with a curse because of their iniquities. And 
when the unbeliever asks, Wherefore hath the Lord done 
this unto the land 1 the same word which foretold that 
the question would be put supplies an answer and as- 
signs the cause. Then shall men say, Because they have 
forsaken the covenant of the Lord God of their fathers, &c, 

The land is defiled under the inhabitants thereof because 
they have transgressed the lav*s f changed the ordinances, 



108 JUDEA. 

broken the everlasting covenant. Therefore hath the curse 
devoured the earth, &c. These expressive words, while 
they declare the cause of the judgments and desolation, 
denote also the great depravity of those who were to in- 
habit the land of Judea during the time of its desolation, 
and while its ancient inhabitants were to be " scattered 
abroad." And although the ignorance of those who 
dwell therein may be pitied, their degeneracy will not be 
denied. The ferocity of the Turks, the predatory habits 
of the Arabs, the abject state of the few poor Jews who 
are suffered to dwell in the land of their fathers, the base 
superstitions of the different Christian sects,— the fre- 
quent contentions that subsist among such a mingled 
and diversified people, and the gross ignorance and great 
depravity that prevail throughout the whole, have all 
sadly changed and stained the moral aspect of that coun- 
try which, from sacred remembrances, is denominated 
the Holy Land, — have converted that region, where alone 
in all the world, and during many ages, the only living 
and true God was worshipped, — and where alone the 
pattern of perfect virtue was ever exhibited to human 
view, or in the human form, into one of the most de- 
graded countries of the globe, and in appropriate terms, 
may well be said to have defiled the land. And it has been 
defiled throughout many an age. The Father of mercies 
afflicteth not willingly, nor grieves the children of men.! 
Sin is ever the precursor of the actual judgments of 
Heaven. It was on account of their idolatry and wicked- 
ness that the ten tribes were earliest plucked from off; 
the land of Israel. The blood of Jesus, according to, 
their prayer, and the full measure of their iniquity, ac- 
cording to their doings, was upon the Jews and upon 
their children. Before they were extirpated from that- 
land which their iniquities had defiled, — it was drenched 
'with the blood of more than a "million of their race. 
Judea afterward had a partial and temporary respite 
from desolation, when Christian churches were estal 
lished there. But in that land, the nursery of Christian 
ity, the seeds of its corruption, or perversion, began soon 
to appear. The moral power of religion decayed, the 
worship of images prevailed, and the nominal disciples 
of a pure faith "broke the everlasting covenant."* The 
doctrine of Mahomet, the Koran or the sword, was 

* Lsaiaii xxiv. 5. 



JUDEA. 109 

tke scourge and the cure of idolatry : but all the native 
impurities of the Mahometan creed succeeded to a grossly- 
corrupted form of Christianity. Since that period, hordes 
of Saracens, Egyptians, Fatimites, Tartars, Mamelouks, 
Turks (a combination of names of unmatched barbarism, 
at least in modern times), have for the space of twelve 
hundred years defiled the land of the children of Israel 
with iniquity and with blood. And in very truth the pro- 
phecy savours not in the least of hyperbole, — the worst 
of the heathen shall possess their houses. And the holy places 
shall be defiled. Omar, on the first conquest of Jerusa- 
lem by the Mahometans, erected a mosque on the site 
of the temple of Solomon: and, jealous as the God of 
Israel is that his glory be not given to another, the un- 
seemly and violent and bloody contentions among Chris- 
tian sects around the very sepulchre of the Author of the 
faith which they dishonour bear not a feebler testimony 
in the present day, than the preceding fact bore, at so re- 
mote a period, to the truth of this prediction. The phren- 
sied zeal of crusading Christians could not expel the 
heathen from Judea, though Europe then poured like a 
torrent upon Asia. But the defilement of the land, no 
less than that of the holy places, is not yet cleansed 
j?,way. And Judea is still defiled to this hour, not only 
by oppressive rulers, but by an unprincipled and a law- 
less people. " The barbarism of Syria," says Voiney, 
" is complete."* " I have often reflected," says Burck- 
hardt, in describing the dishonest conduct of a Greek 
priest in the Hauran (but in words that admit of too gen- 
eral an application) " that if the English penal laws were 
suddenly promulgated in this country, there is scarcely 
any man in business, or who has money dealings with 
others, who would not be liable to transportation before 
the end of the first six months."! " Under the name of 
Christianity, every degrading superstition and profane 
rite, equally remote from the enlightened tenets of the 
gospel and the dignity of human natore, are professed 
and tolerated. The pure gospel of Christ, everywhere 
the herald of civilization and of science, is almost as 
little known in the Holy Land as in California or New 
Holland. A series of legendary traditions, mingled with 
lemains of Judaism, and the wretched phantasies of il- 
literate ascetics may now and then exhibit a glimmering 

* Volney's Travels, vol. ii. p. 442. 
t BurckhardCs Travels in Sy-ia, p. 89. 
10 



110 JUDEA. 

of heavenly light ; but if we seek for the effects of Chris- 
tianity in the land of Canaan, we must look for that period 
when the desert shall blossom as the rose, and the wil- 
derness become a fruitful field.* The land is defiled under 
the inhabitants thereof: because they have transgressed the 
laws, changed the ordinances, broken the everlasting cove- 
nant. — Therefore hath the curse devoured the land, and 

They that dwell therein are desolate. " The government 
of the Turks in Sjnria is a pure military despotism, that 
is, the bulk of the inhabitants are subject to the caprices 
of a faction of armed men, who dispose of every thing 
according to their interest and fancy." " In each gov- 
ernment the pasha is an absolute despot. In the villages 
the inhabitants, limited to the mere necessaries of life, 
have no arts but those without which they cannot subsist." 
" There is no safety without the towns, nor security with- 
in their precincts ;"f and 

Few men left. While their character is thus depraved, 
and their condition miserable, their number is also small 
indeed, as the inhabitants of so extensive and fertile a 
region. After estimating the number of inhabitants in 
Syria in general, Volney remarks, " So feeble a popula- 
tion in so excellent a country may well excite our aston- 
ishment ; but this will be increased, if we compare the 
present number of inhabitants with that of ancient times. 
We are informed by the philosophical geographer Strabo 
that the territories of Yanmia and Yoppa, in Palestine 
alone, were formerly so populous as to bring forty thou- 
sand armed men into the field. At present they could 
scarcely furnish three thousand. From the accounts we 
have of Judea in the time of Titus, which are to be es- 
teemed tolerably accurate, that country must have con- 
tained four millions of inhabitants. If we go still farther 
back into antiquity, we shall find the same populousness 
among the Philistines, the Phenicians, and in the king- 
doms of Samaria and Damascus. "J Though the ancient 
population of the land of Israel be estimated at the low- 
est computation, and the existing population be rated at 
the highest, yet that country does not now contain a tenth 
part of the number of inhabitants which it plentifully 
supported, exclusively from their industry and from the 
rich resources of its own luxuriant soil, for many suc- 

* Clarke's Travels, vol. ii. p. 405. 

f Voiney's Travels, vol. ii. p. 370, 376, 38a 

t Ibid, vol ii p I 



JUDEA. Hi 

cessive centuries ; and how could it possibly have been 
imagined that this identical land would ever yield so 
scanty a subsistence to the desolate dwellers therein, and 
that there would be so few men left ? 

Yet in it shall be a tenth. The city that went out by a 
thousand shall leave an hundred, and that which went out by 
a hundred shall leave ten. The present population of Ju- 
dea has been estimated, without reference to any predic- 
tion, at a tenth of the number by which it was peopled 
previous to the dispersion of the Jews. Volney, on a 
comparative estimate, reduces it even to less. It is im- 
possible to ascertain the precise proportion. The words 
of Pierre Bello, quoted by Malte Brim, though the same 
'n substance with the testimony of others, here afford 
the closest commentary. " A tract from which a hundred 
ndividuals draw a scanty subsistence, formerly main- 
tained thousands"* 

The mirth of the tabret ceaseth, the noise of them that re- 
joice endeth, the joy of the harp ceaseth. Instrumental 
music was common among the Jews. The tabret and 
the harp, the cymbal, the psaltery, and the viol, and other 
instruments of music, are often mentioned as in familiar 
use among the Israelites, and regularly formed a great 
part of the service of the temple. At the period when 
the prediction was delivered, the harp, the viol, and the 
tabret, and pipe, and wine were in their feasts ; and even 
though the Jews have long ceased to be a nation, the use 
of these instruments has not wholly ceased from among 
them. But in the once happy land of Judea the voice 
of mirthful music is at rest. In a general description of 
the state of the arts and sciences in Syria (including the 
whole of the Holy Land) Volney remarks, that adepts 
in music are very rarely to be met with. " They have 
no music but vocal, for they neither know nor esteem 
instrumental ; and they are in the right, for such instru- 
ments as they have, not excepting their flutes, are detest- 
able."! The mirth of the harp ceaseth, the joy of the tabret 
ceaseth. 

But this is not the sole instance in which the melan- 
choly features of that desolate country seem to be trans- 
ferred to the minds of its inhabitants. And the plaintive 
language of the prophet (the significancy of which might 

* Make Brim's Geography, vol. ii. p. 151. 
t Volney *s Tiaveis, vol ii. p. -±oy, 



112 JUDEA. 

well have admitted of some slight modification, if one 
jot or tittle could pass away till all be fulfilled) is true to 
the very letter, when set side by side, unaided by one 
syllable of comment, with the words of a bold and avowed 
unbeliever. 

All the merry-hearted do sigh ; they shall not drink wine 
with a song ; all joy is darkened, the mirth of the land is 
gone. Their shouting shall be no shouting. " Their per- 
formance" (singing) "is accompanied with sighs and 
gestures. They may be said to excel most in the melan- 
choly strain. To behold an Arab with his head inclined, 
his hand applied to his ear, his eyebrows knit, his eyes 
languishing ; to hear his plaintive tones, his sighs and 
sobs, it is almost impossible to refrain from tears."* If 
any further illustration of the prediction be requisite, 
the same ill-fated narrator of facts exhibits anew the 
visions of the prophet. From his description (chap. xl. ) 
of the manners and character of the inhabitants of 
Syria, it is obvious that melancholy is a predominating 
feature. "Instead of that open and cheerful counte- 
nance, which we either naturally possess or assume, 
their behaviour is serious, austere, and melancholy. 
They rarely laugh ; and the gayety of the French 
appears to them a fit of delirium. When they speak it 
is with deliberation, without gesture, and without pas- 
sion; they listen without interrupting you; they are 
silent for whole days together ; and by no means pique 
themselves on supporting conversation. Continually 
seated, they pass whole days musing, with their legs 
crossed, their pipes in their mouths, and. almost without 
changing their attitude. The orientals, in general, have 
a grave and phlegmatic exterior ; a stayed and almost 
listless deportment; and a serious, nay, even sad and 
melancholy countenance."! Having thus explicitly 
stated the fact, Volney, by many arguments, equally 
judicious and just, most successfully combats the idea 
that the climate and soil are the radical cause of so 
striking a phenomenon : and after assigning a multipli- 
city of facts from ancient history, which completely 
disprove the efficacy of such causes, he instances that 
of the Jews, " who, limited to a little state, never ceased 
to struggle for a thousand years against the most power- 
ful empires.^ If the men of these nations were inert," 

• Volne/s Travels, p. 439, .440. t Ibid, p 461, 476. % Ibid P* 464, 



JUDEA. 1 13 

he adds, M what is activity 1 If they were active, where 
then is the influence of climate ] Why, in the same 
countries, where so much energy was displayed in 
former times, do we at present find such profound indo- 
lence ?" And having thus relieved the advocate for the 
inspiration of the Scriptures from the necessity of prov- 
ing that the contrast in the manner and character of the 
present and of the ancient inhabitants of Syria is (even 
now, when the change has become matter of history 
and observation, and when the circumstances respecting 
it are known) incapable of solution from any natural 
causes, such as by some conceivable possibility might 
have been foreseen, he proceeds to point out those real, 
efficacious, and efficient causes, viz. the mode of govern- 
ment and the state of religion and of the laws — the 
nature of which no human sagacity could possibly have 
descried, and which came not into existence or operation 
in the manner in which they have so long continued, for 
many ages subsequent to the period when their full and 
permanent effect was laid open to the full view of the 
prophets of Israel. The fact thus clearly predicted 
and proved is not only astonishing as referable to the 
inhabitants of Judea, and as exhibiting a contrast, than 
which nothing of a similar kind can be more complete, 
but it is so very contradictory to the habits of men and 
customs of nations, that it is totally inexplicable how, 
by any human means, such a fact, even singly, could 
ever have been foretold. From the congregated groups 
of savages, cheered by their simple instruments of 
music, exulting in their war-songs, and revelling in their 
mirth, to the more elegant assemblages of polished so- 
ciety, listening with delight to the triumphs of music, — 
from the huts of the wilderness to the courts of Asia 
and of Europe, and from the wilds of America, the jun- 
gles of India, and even the deserts of Central Africa, to 
the meadows of England, the plains of France, or the 
valleys of Italy; the experience of mankind in every 
clime,- — except partially where the blasting influence of 
the crescent is felt, — proclaims as untrue to nature the 
predicted fact, which actually has been permanently char- 
acteristic of the inhabitants of the once happy land of 
Israel. The fact perhaps would have been but slowly 
credited ; and the synonymous terms of the ample de- 
scription and of the repeated prophecies, might have 
10* 



114 JUDEA. 

been reckoned the fiction o/ a biassed judgment, had a 
Christian, instead of Volnej 7 ", been the witness. 

They shall not drink wine with a song. Strong drink 
shall be bitter unto them that drink it. The more closely 
that the author of the Ruins of Empires traces the causes 
in which the desolation of these regions and the ca- 
lamities of the inhabitants originate, he supplies more 
abundant data for a demonstration that the prophecies 
respecting them cannot but be divine. "One of the 
chief sources," continues Volney, " of gayety with us 
is the social intercourse of the table, and the use of 
wine. The orientals (Syrians) are almost strangers to 
this double enjoyment. Good cheer would infallibly 
expose them to extortion, and wine to corporal punish- 
ment, from the zeal of the police in enforcing the pre- 
cepts of the Koran. It is with great reluctance the 
Mahometans tolerate the Christians the use of the liquor 
they envy them."* To this statement maybe subjoined 
the more direct but equally unapplied testimony of 
recent travellers. "The wines of Jerusalem," says Mr. 
Joliffe, " are most execrable. In a country where every 
species of vinous liquor is strictly prohibited by the con- 
current authorities of law and gospel, a single fountain 
may be considered of infinitely greater value than many 
wine-pr_sses."t Mr. Wilson relates that "the wine 
drank in Jerusalem is probably the very worst to be met 
with in any country." J While the intolerance and des- 
potism of the Turks, and the rapacity and wildness of 
the Arabs, have blighted the produce of Judea, and 
render abortive all the influence of climate and all the 
fertility of that land of vines, the unnatural prohibition 
of the use of wine, and the rigour with which that pro- 
hibition is enforced, have peculiarly operated against the 
cultivation of the vine, and turned the treading of the 
wine-press into an odious and unprofitable task. Yet, 
in a country where the vine grows spontaneously, and 
which was celebrated for the excellence of its wines,§ 
nothing less than the operation of causes unnatural and 
extreme as these could have verified the language of 
prophecy. But in this instance, as truly as in every 
other, a recapitulation of the prophecies is the best sum- 
mary of the facts. And, by only changing the future 

* Volney's Travels, vol. ii. p. 480. 

t .Toiiffe's Letters from Palestine, vol. i. p. 184. 

t Wilson's Travels, p. 130. § Reland. Palest, p. 381, 792. 



JUDEA. 115 

into the present and the past, after an interval of two 
thousand five hundred years, no eyewitness, writing on 
the spot, could delineate a more accurate representation 
of the existing state of Judea, than in the very words 
of Isaiah, in which, as in those of other prophets, the 
various and desultory observations of travellers are 
concentrated into a description equally perspicuous and 
true. 

" Many days and years shall ye be troubled, for the 
vintage shall fail, the gathering shall not come. They 
shall lament for the teats, for the pleasant fields, for the 
fruitful vine. Upon the land of my people shall come 
up thorns and briers : yea, upon all the houses of joy in 
the joyous city. Because the palaces shall be forsaken 
— the multitude of the city shall be left — the forts and 
towns shall be for dens — a joy of wild asses — a pasture 
of flocks.* The highways lie waste — the wayfaring 
man ceaseth — the earth mourneth and languisheth. 
Lebanon is ashamed, and hewn down, or withered away 
— Sharon is like a wilderness — and Bashan and Carmel 
shake off their fruits. f The land shall be utterly 
emptied and utterly despoiled. The earth mourneth 
and fadeth away: it is denied under the inhabitants 
thereof. Because they have transgressed the laws, 
therefore hath the curse devoured the earth, and they 
that dwell therein are desolate, and few men left : the 
vine languisheth, all the merry-hearted do sigh. The 
mirth' of tabrets ceaseth — the noise of them that rejoice 
endeth — the joy of the harp ceaseth. They shall not 
drink wine with a song — strong drink shall be bitter 
to them that drink it — the city of confusion is broken 
down — all joy is darkened— the mirth of the land is 
gone. "J 

To this picture of common and general devastation, 
that no distinguishing feature might be left untouched 
or untraced by his pencil, the prophet adds, " When 
thus it shall be in the midst of the land, there shall be 
as the shaking of an olive-tree, and as the gleaning of 
grapes when the vintage is done.§ The glory of Jacob 
shall be made thin : and it shall be, as when the harvest- 
man gathereth the corn and reapeth the ears with his 
arm — yet gleaning grapes shall be left in it, as the shaking 



* Isaiah xxxii. 10-14. t Isaiah xxxiii. 8, 9. 

{ Isaiah xxiv. 3, &c. § Isaiah xxiv. 13. 



116 JUDEA. 

ol an olive-tree, two or three berries in the top of 
the uppermost bough, four or five in the outmost fruitful 
branches thereof."* These words imply, as is other- 
wise declared without a metaphor, that a small remnant 
would be left — that though Judea should become poor 
like a field that has been reaped, or like a vine stripped 
of its fruits, its desolation would not be so complete but 
that some vestige of its former abundance would be still 
visible, like the few grains that are left by the reaper 
when the harvest is past, or the little remaining fruit that 
hangs on the uppermost branch, or on a neglected bough, 
after the full crop has been gathered, and the vine and 
the olive have been shaken. And is there yet a gleaning 
left of ail the glory of Israel] There is; and there 
could not be any simile more natural, or more expressive 
of the fact. Napolose (the ancient Sychar or Sichem) 
is luxuriantly imbosomed in the most delightful and 
fragrant bowers, half-concealed by rich gardens and by- 
stately trees, collected into groves ail around the beauti- 
ful valley in which it stands. f The garden of Geddin, 
situated on the borders of Mount Sharon, and protected 
by its chief, extends several miles in a spacious valley, 
abounding with excellent fruits, such as olives, almonds, 
peaches, apricots, and figs. A number of streams that 
fall from the mountains traverse it, and water the cotton- 
plants that thrive well in this fertile soil.J The scenery 
in the plain of Zabulon is, to the full, as delightful as in 
the rich vale upon the south of the Crimea ; — it reminds 
the traveller of the finest part of Kent and Surrey.^ 
The soil, although stony, is exceedingly rich, but now 
entirely neglected. But the delightful vale of Zabulon 
appears everywhere covered with spontaneous vegeta- 
tion, flourishing in the wildest exuberance. Even along 
the mountains of Gilead, the land, possessing extraor- 

* Isaiah xvii. 5, 6. 

t Clarke, vol. ii. 506. The remark may be interesting to the Christian 
reader, that, while Capernaum, the capital of Galilee, which was "exalted 
unto heaven," or the highest prosperity, when Jesus and his apostles preached 
there in vain, is brought down to hell (to hades), to death > or entire destruc- 
tion, being nothing now but shapeless ruins, as Chorazin and Bethsaida also 
are,— and while Samaria, the capital of the country which bore its name, is 
cast down into the valley,— Sychar, then one of its inferior cities, from which 
the inhabitants came forth to meet Jesus, and in which many believed in him 
as the Saviour when they heard his word, is ranked by every traveller who 
describes it among the most striking exceptions to the general desolation 
which has otherwise left but a remembrance of the cities of Judah, of Sam* 
ria, and Galilee. 

t Mariti's Travels, vol. ii. 151. $ Clarke, vol. ii. 400. 



SAMARIA. 117 

dinary riches, abounds with the most beautiful prospects, 
is clothed with rich forests, varied with verdant slopes ; 
and extensive plains of a fine red soil are now covered 
with thistles, as the best proof of its fertility.* The 
valley of St. John's, in the vicinity of Jerusalem, is 
crowned to the top with olives and vines, while the lower 
part of the valley bears the milder fig and almond, f 
Whenever any spot is fixed on as the residence, and 
seized as the property, either of a Turkish aga or of an 
Arab sheikh, it enjoys his protection, is made to admin- 
ister to his wants, or to his luxury, and the exuberance 
and beauty of the land of Canaan soon reappear. But 
such spots are, in the words of an eyewitness, only 
" mere sprinklings" in the midst of extensive desolation. 
And how could it ever have been foreseen that the same 
cause, viz. the residence of despotic spoliators, was to 
operate in so strange a manner as to spread a wide 
wasting desolation over the face of the country, and to 
be, at the same time, the very means of preserving the 
thin gleanings of its ancient glory; or that a few berries 
on the outmost bough would be saved by the same hand 
that was to shake the olive. 

Among such a multiplicity of prophecies, where the 
prediction and the fulfilment of each is a miracle, it is 
almost impossible to select any as more amazing than 
the rest. But that concerning Samaria is not the least 
remarkable. That city was, for a long period, the capi- 
tal of the ten tribes of Israel. Herod the Great enlarged 
and adorned it, and, in honour of Augustus Caesar, gave 
it the name of Sebaste. There are many ancient medals 
which were struck there. t It was the seat of a bishop- 
ric, as the subscription of some of its bishops to the acts 
of ancient councils attest. Its history is thus brought 
down to a period unquestionably far remote from the 
time of the prediction; and the narrative of a traveller, 
which alludes not to the prophecy, and which has even 
been unnoticed by commentators, show r s its complete 
fulfilment. Besides other passages which speak of its 
extinction as a city, the word of the Lord which Micah saw 
concerning Samaria is, " I will make Samaria as a heap 
of the field, and as plantings of a vineyard : and 1 will 
poi n r down the stones thereof into the valley : and I will 

* Buckingham's Travels p. 32?. | General Straton's MS. Travel* 

t Calmet's Dictionary. Relandi Palest, p. 981. 



118 JERUSALEM. 

discover the foundations thereof." And this great city 
is now wholly converted into gardens ; and all the tokens 
that remain to testify that there has ever been such a 
place are only on the north side — a large square piazza, 
encompassed with pillars, — and on the east some poor 
remains of a great church. Such was the first notice 
of that ancient capital given by Maundrell in 1698, and ii 
is confirmed by Mr. Buckingham in 1816. The relative 
distance, local position, and unaltered name of Sebaste 
leave no doubt as to the identity of its site ; and he 
adds, its local features are equally seen in the threat of 
Micah.* 

But the predicted fate of Jerusalem has been more con- 
spicuously displayed and more fully illustrated than that 
of the capital of the ten tribes of Israel. It formed the 
theme of prophecy from the deathbed of Jacob — and, as 
the seat of government of the children of Judah, the 
sceptre departed not from it till the Messiah appeared, 
on the expiration of seventeen hundred years after the 
death of the patriarch, and till the period of its deso- 
lation, prophesied of by Daniel^ had arrived. A destiny 
diametrically opposite to the former then awaited it, even 
for a longer duration ; and ere its greatness was gone, 
even at the very time when it was crowded with Jews 
from all quarters, resorting to the feast, and when it was 
inhabited by a numerous population dwelling in security 
and peace, its doom was denounced — that it was to be 
trodden down of the Gentiles, till the time of the Gen- 
tiles should be fulfilled. The time of the Gentiles is not 
yet fulfilled, and Jerusalem is still trodden down of the 
Gentiles. The Jews have often attempted to recover it. 
No distance of space or of time can separate it from 
their affections — they perform their devotions with their 
faces towards it, as if it were the object of their worship 
as well as of their love ; and although their desire to re- 
turn be so strong, indelible, and innate that every Jew, 
in every generation, counts himself an exile — yet they 
have never been able to rebuild their temple, nor to re- 
cover Jerusalem from the hands of the Gentiles. But 
greater power than that of a proscribed and exiled race 

* Buckingham's Travels, p. 511, 512. It has also been described in similar 
terms by other travellers. The stones are poured down into ihe valley, the 
foundations discovered, and there is now only to be seen " the hill where once 
stood Samaria." Napolose has been mistaken by one traveller for the ancient 
Bamaria. 



JERUSALEM. 119 

has been added to their own, in attempting- to frustrate 
the counsel that professed to he of God. Julian, the em- 
peror of the Romans, not only permitted but invited the 
Jews to rebuild Jerusalem and their temple ; and prom- 
ised to re-establish them in their paternal city. By that 
single act, more than by all his writings, he might have 
destroyed the credibility of the gospel, and restored his 
beloved but deserted paganism. The zeal of the Jews 
was equal to his own — and the work was begun by lay- 
ing again the foundations of the temple. In the space of 
three days, Titus had formerly encompassed that city 
with a wall when it was crowded with his enemies ; 
and, instead of being obstructed, that great work, when 
it was confirmatory of an express prediction of Jesus, 
was completed with an astonishing celerity : — and what 
could hinder the emperor of Rome from building a tem- 
ple at Jerusalem wiien every Jew was zealous for the 
work 1 Nothing appeared against it but a single sen- 
tence, uttered some centuries before by one who had 
been crucified. If that word had been of man, would all 
the power of the monarch of the world have been thwarted 
in opposing it 1 And why did not Julian, with all his in- 
veterate enmity and laborious opposition to Christianity, 
execute a work so easy and desirable ] A heathen his- 
torian relates, that fearful balls of fire, bursting from the 
earth, sometimes burned the workmen, rendered the place 
inaccessible, and caused them to desist from the under- 
taking.* The same narrative is attested by others. 
Chrysostom, who was a living witness, appealed to the 
existing state of the foundations, and to the universal 
testimony which was given of the fact. And an eminent 
modern traveller, who visited, and who minutely exam- 
ined the spot, testifies that " there seems every reason 
for believing that, in the reticulated remains still visible 
on the site of the temple is seen a standing memorial of 

* Imperii sui memoriam magnitudine operum gestiens propagare, ambitio- 
snm quondam apud Hierosolymam ternplum. quod, post multa et interueeiva 
cert ami na obsidcnte Vespasiano, posteaque Tito, segre est expuguaturri, in- 
staurare sumptibus coeitabat immodicis ; negotiumque maturandum Alypio 
lederat Antioehensi, qui olim Brit tan nias curaverat pro praeibetis. Cum itaqtie 
rt'i eidem instaret Alypius, juvaretque provincial rector, metuendi globi rlam 
marum, prope fundaruenta, crebrig assultibus erumpentes, fecere locum ex 
ustis aliquoiies operantibus inaccessum ; hocque modo, elemento destinatiug 
repeilente. cessavit inceptum. — Ammian M&rcell. lib. xxiii. cap. 1, vj> 2,3. Ru- 
fiui Hist. Eccles. lib. i. c. 37. Socrat. lib. iii. c. 17. Theodora. 1. iii". c. 17. So- 
zomm, 1. v. c. 21. Oassiod. Hist. Tripart. I. vi. c. 43. Nicephor. Callis. lib. x. 
32. Greg. Naziiinz. in Julian. Orat. 2. C'srysos. delan. Bub. Mart, et contra 
Judeos, ;ii. p. i'Jl. I.iud- — Vide Am. Mar. iu;n. iii. p. 2. 



120 JERUSALEM. 

Julian's discomfiture."* While destitute of this additional 
confirmation of its truth, the historical evidence was too 
strong even for the skepticism of Gibbon altogether to 
gainsay; and brought him to the acknowledgment that 
such authority must astonish an incredulous mind. Even 
independent of tne miraculous interposition, the fulfil- 
ment is the same. The attempt was made avowedly, and 
it was abandoned without any apparent cause. It was 
never accomplished — and the prophecy stands fulfilled. 
But, even if the attempt of Julian had never been made, 
the truth of the prophecy itself is unassailable. The 
Jews have never been reinstated in Judea. Jerusalem 
has ever been trodden down of the Gentiles. The edict 
of Adrian was renewed by the successors of Julian — and 
no Jews could approach unto Jerusalem but by bribery or 
by stealth. It was a spot unlawful for them to touch. 
In the crusades, all the power of Europe was employed 
to rescue Jerusalem from the heathens, but equally in 
vain. It has been trodden down for nearly eighteen 
centuries by its successive masters — by Romans, Gre- 
cians, Persians, Saracens, Mamelouks, Turks, Chris- 
tians — and again by the worst of rulers, the Arabs 
and the Turks. And could any thing be more improb- 
able to have happened, or more impossible to have 
been foreseen by man, than that any people should be 
banished from their own capital and country, and re- 
main expelled and expatriated for nearly eighteen hun- 
dred years ? Did the same fate ever befall any nation, 
though no prophecy existed respecting it ] Is there any 
doctrine in Scripture so hard to be believed as was this 
single fact at the period of its prediction? And even 
with the example of the Jews before us, is it likely, or is 
it credible, or who can foretel — that the present inhabit- 
ants of any country upon earth shall be banished into ail 
nations — retain their distinctive character — meet with an 
unparalleled fate — continue a people — without a govern- 
ment and without a country — and remain for an indefi- 
nite period, exceeding seventeen hundred years, till the 
fulfilment of a prescribed event which has yet to be ac- 
complished 1 Must not the knowledge of such truths be 
derived from that prescience alone which scans alike 
the will and the ways of mortals, the actions of future 
nations, and the history of the latest generations. 

* Clarke's Travels, vol. ii. note 1, at the end of the volume 



AMMON. 121 

But the prophecies are not confined to the land of 
Judea, they are equally unlimited in their range over 
space as over time. After a lapse of many ages, the 
countries around Judea are now beginning to be known. 
And each succeeding traveller, in the communication of 
uew discoveries concerning them, is gradually unfolding 
the very description which the prophets gave of their 
poverty and desolation, at the time of their great pros- 
perity and luxuriance. The countries of the Ammon- 
ites — of the Moabites — of the Edomites, or inhabitants 
of Idumea — and of the Philistines, all bordered with 
Judea, and each is the theme of prophecy. The relative 
positions of them all are distinctly defined in Scripture, 
and have been clearly ascertained.* And the territories 
of the ancient enemies of the Jews, long overrun by the 
enemies of Christianity, present many a proof of the 
inspiration of the Jewish Scriptures, and of the truth of 
the Christian religion. 

AMMON. 

The country anciently peopled by the Ammonites is 
situated to the east of Palestine, and is now possessed 
partly by the Arabs and by the Turks. It is naturally 
one of the most fertile provinces of Syria, and it was for 
many ages one of the most populous. The Ammonites 
often invaded the land of Israel, and at one period, united 
with the Moabites, they retained possession of a great 
part of it, and grievously oppressed the Israelites for the 
space of eighteen years. Jephthah repulsed them and 
took twenty of their cities ; but they continued after- 
ward to harass the borders of Israel — and their capital 
was besieged by the forces of David, and their country 
rendered tributary. They regained and long maintained 
their independence, till Jotham the king of Judah subdued 
them, and exacted from them an annual tribute of a hun- 
dred talents, and thirty thousand quarters of wheat and 
barley ; yet they soon contested again with their ancient 
enemies, and exulted in the miseries that befell them 
when Nebuchadnezzar took Jerusalem and carried its in- 
habitants into captivity. In after-times, though succes- 
sively oppressed by the Chaldeans (when some of the 

* Relandi Palestina Illustrata; D'Anville's Map; Maps in Volney's, 
Burckhardt's, and Buckingham's Travels* Well's Scripture Geography ; Gib- 
bon's History ; Shaw's Travels, &c. 

11 F 



122 AMMON. 

earliest prophecies respecting it were fulfilled), and by 
the Egyptians and Syrians, Am mon was a highly produc- 
tive and populous country when the Romans became 
masters of all the provinces of Syria ; and several of 
the ten allied cities which gave name to the celebrated 
Decapolis were included within its boundaries. Even 
" when first invaded, by the Saracens, this country" (in- 
cluding Moab) " was enriched by the various benefits of 
trade, was covered with a line of forts, and possessed 
some strong and populous cities."* Volney bears wit- 
ness, " that in the immense plains of the Hainan ruins 
are continually to be met with, and that what is said of 
its actual fertility perfectly corresponds with the idea 
given of it in the Hebrew writings."! The fact of its 
natural fertility is corroborated by every traveller who 
has visited it. And " it is evident," says Burckhardt, 
"that the whole country must have been extremely well 
cultivated, in order to have afforded subsistence to the 
inhabitants of so many towns,"! as are now visible only 
in their ruins. While the fruitfulness of the land of 
Amnion, and the high degree of prosperity and power in 
which it subsisted, long prior and long subsequent to the 
date of the predictions, are thus indisputably established 
by historical evidence and by existing proofs, the re- 
searches of recent travellers (who were actuated by the 

* Gibbon's History, vol. v. p. 240, c. 51. t Volney's Travels, vol. ii. p. 299. 

$. Burckhardt's Travels in Syria, p. 357. 

Having frequent occasion in the subsequent pages to refer to the authority 
of the celebrated and lamented traveller J. Lewis Burckhardt, the following 
ample testimonies to his talents, perseverance, and veracity will show with 
what perfect confidence his statements may be relied on, especially as the 
subject of the fulfilment of prophecy, being never once alluded to in all his 
writings, seems to have been wholly foreign to his view. — " He was a traveller 
of no ordinary description, a gentleman by birth, and a scholar by education ; 
he added to the ordinary acquirements of a traveller accomplishments which 
fitted him for any society. His descriptions of the countries through which 
he passed, his narrative of incidents, his transactions with the natives, are all 
placed before us with equal clearness and simplicity. In every page they will 
find that ardour of research, — that patience of investigation, — that passionate 
pursuit after truth for which he was eminently distinguished." — Quarterly Re- 
view, Vol. XXII. p. 437. " He appears from his books and letters to have 
been a modest, laborious, learned, and sensible man ; exempt from prejudice, 
unattached to systems; detailing what he saw plainly and correctly, and of 
very prudent and discreet conduct." — Edinburgh Review, No. LXVII. p. 109. 
The following extract from General Straton's manuscript Travels was written 
at Cairo, and is the more valuable as containing the result of personal knowledge 
and observation :— " Burckhardt speaks Arabic perfectly, has adopted the cos- 
tume, and goes to the religious places of worship, has been at Mecca ; in short, 
follows in every thing the Turkish manners and customs, and he is not to be 
distinguished from a Mussulman. With what advantage must he travel ! He 
is by birth a Swiss, but having been educated in England, speaks our language 
perfectly." 



AMMON. 123 

mere desire of exploring these regions and obtaining 
geographical information) have made known its present 
aspect ; and testimony the most clear, unexceptionable, 
and conclusive has been borne to the state of dire deso- 
lation to which it is and has long been reduced. 

It was prophesied concerning Ammon, " Son of man, 
set thy face against the Ammonites, and prophesy against 
them. I will make Rabbah of the Ammonites a stable 
for camels and a couching-place for flocks. Behold I 
will stretch out my hand upon thee, and deliver thee for 
a spoil to the heathen ; I will cut thee off from the people, 
and cause thee to perish out of the countries ; I will de- 
stroy thee. The Ammonites shall not be remembered 
among the nations. Rabbah (the chief city) of the Am- 
monites shall be a desolate heap. Ammon shall be a 
perpetual desolation."* 

Ammon ivas to be delivered to be a spoil to the heathen — 
to be destroyed, and to be a perpetual desolation. " All this 
country, formerly so populous and flourishing, is now 
changed into a vast desert. "f Ruins are seen in every 
direction. The country is divided between the Turks and 
the Arabs, but chiefly possessed by the latter. The ex- 
tortions of the one and the depredations of the other 
keep it in perpetual desolation, and make it a spoil to the 
heathen. " The far greater part of the country is unin- 
habited, being abandoned to the wandering Arabs, and 
the towns and villages are in a state of total ruin."J 
" At every step are to be found the vestiges of ancient 
cities, the remains of many temples, public edifices, and 
Greek churches. "§ The cities are desolate. " Many 
of the ruins present no objects of any interest. They 
consist of a few walls of dwelling-houses, heaps of 
stones, the foundations of some public edifices, and a 
few cisterns filled up ; there is nothing entire, but it ap- 
pears that the mode of building was very solid, all the 
remains being formed of large stones. — In the vicinity 
of Ammon there is a fertile plain interspersed with low 
hills, which for the greater part are covered with ruins. "|| 

While the country is thus despoiled and desolate, there 
are valleys and tracts throughout it which " are covered 
with a fine coat of verdant pasture, and are places of re- 

* Ezek. xxv. 2, 5, 7, 10 ; xxi. 32. Jerem. xix. 2. Zeph. ii. 9. 
t Seetzen's Travels, p. 34. % Ibid. p. 37. 

$ Burckhardfs Travels in Nubia, Introd. p. 37, 38, 44. 
f| Burckhardt's Travels in Syria, p. 355, 357. 3&4. 



124 AMMON. 

sort to the Bedouins, where they pasture their camels and 
their sheep."* " The whole way we traversed," says 
Seetzen, " we saw villages in rains, and met numbers of 
Arabs with their camels" &c. Mr. Buckingham describes 
a building among the ruins of Amnion, " the masonry of 
which was evidently constructed of materials gathered 
from the ruins of other and older buildings on the spot- 
On entering it at the south end," he adds, " we came to an 
open square court, with arched recesses on each side, 
the sides nearly facing the cardinal points. The re- 
cesses in the northern and southern walls were originally 
open passages, and had arched doorways facing each 
other — but the first of these was found wholly closed up, 
and the last was partially filled up, leaving only a narrow 
passage, just sufficient for the entrance of one man and 
of the goats, which the Arab keepers drive in here occa- 
sionally for shelter during the night." He relates that 
he lay down among " flocks of sheep and goats," close 
beside the ruins of Amnion; — and particularly remarks 
that, during the night, he was almost entirely prevented 
from sleeping by the " bleating of flocks. "f So literally 
true is it, although Seetzen, and Burckhardt, and Buck- 
ingham, who relate the facts, make no reference or allu- 
sion whatever to any of the prophecies, and travelled for 
a different object than the elucidation of the Scriptures, 
— that the chief city of the Ammonites is a stable for camels, 
and a couching-place for flocks. 

The Ammonites shall not be remembered among the na- 
tions. While the Jews, who were long their hereditary 
enemies, continue as distinct a people as ever, though 
dispersed among all nations, no trace of the Ammonites 
remains ; none are now designated by their name, nor do 
any claim descent from them. They did exist, however, 
long after the time when the eventual annihilation of 
their race was foretold, for they retained their name, and 
continued a great multitude until the second century of 
the Christian era.J Yet they are cut off from the people. 
Ammon has perished out of the countries ; it is destroyed. 
No people is attached to its soil — none regard it as their 
country and adopt its name : and the Ammonites are not 
t emembered among the nations. 

* Buckingham's Travels in Palestine, &c. p. 329. 

t Buckingham's Travels among the Arab Tribes, under the title of Ruins of 
Ammon, p. 72, 73, &c. 
t Justin Martyr, p. 392. Ed. Thirlb. 



AMMOX. 125 

Rahbah (Rabbah Amnion, the chief city of Amnion) 
shall be a desolate heap. Situated, as it was, on each side 
of the borders of a plentiful stream ; encircled by a fruit- 
ful region ; strong by nature and fortified by art ; nothing 
could have justified the suspicion, or warranted the con- 
jecture in the mind of an uninspired mortal, that the royal 
city of Ammon, whatever disasters might possibly befall 
it in the fate of war or change of masters, would ever un- 
dergo so total a transmutation as to become a desolate 
heap. But although, in addition to such tokens of its 
continuance as a city, more than a thousand years had 
given uninterrupted experience of its stability, ere the 
prophets of Israel denounced its fate ; yet a period of 
equal length has now marked it out, as it exists to this 
day, a desolate heap — a perpetual or permanent deso- 
lation. Its ancient name is still preserved by the Arabs, 
and its site is now " covered with the ruins of private 
buildings ; nothing of them remaining except the founda- 
tions and some of the doorposts. The buildings, ex- 
posed to the atmosphere, are all in decay,"* so that they 
may be said literally to form a desolate heap. The pub- 
lic edifices, which once strengthened or adorned the city, 
after a long resistance to decay, are now also desolate ; 
and the remains of the most entire among them, sub- 
jected as they are to the abuse and spoliation of the wild 
Arabs, can be adapted to no better object than a stable for 
camels. Yet these broken walls and ruined palaces, 
which attest the ancient splendour of Ammon, can now 
be made subservient, by means of a single act of reflec- 
tion, or simple process of reason, to a far nobler purpose 
than the most magnificent edifices on earth can be, when 
they are contemplated as monuments on which the his- 
toric and prophetic truth of Scripture is blended in one 
bright inscription. A minute detail of them may not 
therefore be uninteresting. 

Seetzen (whose indefatigable ardour led him, in de- 
fiance of danger, the first to explore the countries which 
lie east of the Jordan, and east and south of the Dead 
Sea, or the territories of Ammon, Moab, and Edom) justly 
characterizes Ammon as " once the residence of many 
kings — an ancient town which flourished long before the 
Greeks and Romans, and even before the Hebrews ;"f 

* Burckhardt's Travels in Syria, p. 359. 

t A brief Account of the Countries adjoining the Lake of Tiberias, the Jordan, 



126 MOAB. 

and he briefly enumerates those remains of ancient great- 
ness and splendour which are most distinguishable amid 
its ruins. " Although this town has been destroyed and 
deserted for many ages, I still found there some remark- 
able ruins, which attest its ancient splendour. Such as, 
1st, A square building, very highly ornamented, which has 
been perhaps a mausoleum. 2d, The ruins of a large 
palace. 3d, A magnificent amphitheatre of immense 
size, and well preserved, with a peristyle of Corinthian 
pillars without pedestals. 4th, A temple with a great 
number of columns. 5th, The ruins of a large church, 
perhaps the see of a bishop in the time of the Greek em- 
perors. 6th, The remains of a temple with columns set 
in a circular form, and which are of an extraordinary 
size. 7th, The remains of the ancient wall, with many 
other edifices."* Burckhardt, who afterward visited the 
spot, describes it with greater minuteness. He gives a 
plan of the ruins ; and particularly noted the ruins of 
many temples, of a spacious church, a curved wall, a high 
arched bridge, the banks and bed of the river still par- 
tially paved; a large theatre with successive tiers of 
apartments excavated in the rocky side of a hill ; Co- 
rinthian columns fifteen feet high ; the castle, a very ex- 
tensive building, the walls of which are thick, and denote 
a remote antiquity; many cisterns and vaults; and a 
plain covered with the decayed ruins of private build- 
ings ;f — monuments of ancient splendour standing amid 
a desolate heap. 

MOAB. 

The prophecies concerning Moab are more numerous 
and not less remarkable. Those of them which met their 
completion in ancient time, and which related to par- 
ticular events in the history of the Moabites, and to the 
result of their conflicts with the Jews or any of the neigh- 
bouring states, however necessary they may have been 
at the time for strengthening the faith or supporting the 
courage of the children of Israel, need not now be ad- 
duced in evidence of inspiration ; for there are abundant 
predictions which refer so clearly to decisive and un- 

and the Dead Sea, by M. Seetzen, Conseiler d'Ambassade de S. M. l'Empereur 
de Russia, p. 35, 36. 

* Seetzen's Travels, p. 35, 36. 

t BurckbaTdt's Travels in Syria, p. 358, &c 



MOAB. 127 

questionable facts, that there is scarcely a single feature 
peculiar to the land of Moab, as it now exists, which was 
not marked by the prophets in their delineation of the low 
estate to which, from the height of its wickedness and 
haughtiness, it was finally to be brought down. 

" Against Moab, thus saith the Lord of Hosts, the God 
of Israel, Wo unto Nebo ! for it is spoiled ; Kiriathaim 
is confounded and taken ; Misgab is confounded and dis- 
mayed. There shall be no more praise of Moab. — And 
the spoiler shall come upon every city, and no city shall 
escape ; the valley also shall perish, and the plain shall 
be destroyed, as the Lord hath spoken. Give wings 
unto Moab, that it may flee and get away : for the cities 
thereof shall be desolate, without any to dwell therein. — 
Moab hath been at ease from his youth, and he hath set- 
tled on his lees ; and hath not been emptied from vessel 
to vessel, neither hath he gone into captivity. Behold 
the days come, saith the Lord, that 1 will send unto him 
wanderers, that shall cause him to wander. — How is the 
strong staff broken, and the beautiful rod ! — Thou daugh- 
ter that dost inhabit Dibon, come down from thy glory 
and sit in thirst ; for the spoiler of Moab shall come upon 
thee, and he shall destroy thy strongholds. Moab is 
confounded, for it is broken down. Moab is spoiled. 
And judgment is come upon the plain country ; upon 
Holon, and upon Jahazah, and upon Mephaath, and upon 
Dibon, and upon Nebo, and upon Bethdiblathaim ; upon 
Kiriathaim, Bethgamul, Bethmeon, and upon Kerioth, 
and upon Bozrah, and upon all the cities of the land of 
Moab, far and near. The horn of Moab is cut off, and 
his arm is broken, saith the Lord. O ye that dwell in 
Moab, leave the cities and dwell in the rock ; and be like 
the dove that maketh her nest in the sides of the hole's 
mouth. We have heard of the pride of Moab (he is ex- 
ceeding proud), his loftiness, and his arrogancy, and his 
pride, and the haughtiness of his heart. — And joy and 
gladness is taken from the plentiful field, and from the 
land of Moab. I have caused wine to fail from the 
winepresses. None shall tread with shouting; their 
shouting shall be no shouting. From the city of Hesh- 
bon, even unto Elealeh, and even unto Jahaz, have they 
uttered their voice from Zoar even unto Horonaim ; the 
waters also of Nimrim shall be desolate. I have broken 
Moab like a vessel wherein is no pleasure. They shall 
cry, How is it broken down ! And Moab shall be de- 



128 MOAE. 

stroyed from being a people, because he hath magnified 
himself against the Lord. The cities of Aroer are for- 
saken ; they shall be for flocks, which shall lie down, and 
none shall make them afraid. Moab shall be a perpetual 
desolation."* 

The land of Moab lay to the east and south-east of 
Judea, and bordered on the east, north-east, and partly on 
the south of the Dead Sea. Its early history is nearly 
analogous to that of Ammon ; and the soil, though per- 
haps more diversified, is, in many places where the 
desert and plains of salt have not encroached on its bon- 
ders, of equal fertility. There a*re manifest and abundant 
vestiges of its ancient greatness. " The whole of the 
plains are covered with the sites of towns, on every emi- 
nence or spot convenient for the construction of one. 
And as the land is capable of rich cultivation, there can 
be no doubt that the country now so deserted once pre- 
sented a continued picture of plenty and fertility."! 
The form of fields is still visible ; and there are the re- 
mains of Roman highways, which in some places are 
completely paved, and on which there are milestones of 
the times of Trajan, Marcus Aurelius, and Severus, with 
the number of the miles legible upon them. Wherever 
any spot is cultivated the corn is luxuriant : and the 
riches of the soil cannot perhaps be more clearly illus- 
trated than by the fact, that one grain of Heshbon wheat 
exceeds in dimensions two of the ordinary sort, and more 
than double the number of grains grow on the stalk. 
The frequency and almost, in many instances, the close 
vicinity of the sites of the ancient towns, "prove that 
the population of the country was formerly proportioned 
to its natural fertility.""! Such evidence may surely suf- 
fice to prove, that the country was well cultivated and 
peopled at a period so long posterior to the date of the 
predictions, that no cause less than supernatural could 
have existed at the time when they were delivered, 
which could have authorized the assertion with the least 
probability or apparent possibility of its truth, that Moab 
would ever have been reduced to that state of great and 
permanent desolation in which it has continued for so 
many ages, and which vindicates and ratifies to this houi 
the truth ol the scriptural prophecies. 

* Jer. xlviii. 1, 2, 8, 9, 11, 12, 18-28, 29-42. Is. xvii. 2. Zeph. ii. 9. 
t Captains Irby and Mangles's Travels, p. 370. 
X Ibid. p. 377, 378, 456, 460. 



MOAB. 129 

The cities of Moab were to be desolate without any to 
dwell therein ; no city was to escape. Moab was to flee away. 
And the cities of Moab have all disappeared. Their 
place, together with the adjoining part of Idumea, is 
characterized, in the map of Volney's Travels, by the 
ruins of towns. His information respecting these ruins 
was derived from some of the wandering Arabs ; and its 
accuracy has been fully corroborated by the testimony 
of different European travellers of high respectability 
and undoubted veracity, who have since visited this de- 
vastated region. The whole country abounds with ruins. 
And Burckhardt, who encountered many difficulties in 
so desolate and dangerous a land, thus records the brief 
history of a few of them : " The ruins of Eleale, Hesh- 
bon, Meon, Medaba, Di.bon, Aroer, still subsist to illus- 
trate the history of the Beni Israel."* And it might 
with equal truth have been added, that they still subsist 
to confirm the inspiration of the Jewish Scripture, or to 
prove that the seers of Israel were the prophets of God, 
for the desolation of each of these very cities was the 
theme of a prediction. Every thing worthy of observa- 
tion respecting them has been detailed, not only in 
Burckhardt's Travels in Syria, but also by Seetzen, and, 
more recently, by Captains Irby and Mangles, who, along 
with Mr. Bankes and Mr. Legh, visited this deserted dis- 
trict. The predicted judgment has fallen with such 
truth upon these cities, and upon all the cities of the 
land of Moab far and near, and they are so utterly broken 
down, that even the prying curiosity of such indefatigable 
travellers could discover among a multiplicity of ruins 
only a few remains so entire as to be worthy of particu- 
lar notice. The subjoined description is drawn from their 
united testimony. — Among the ruins of El Aal (Eleale) 
an) a number of large cisterns, fragments of buildings, 
and foundations of houses. f At Heshban (Heshbon) 
are the ruins of a large ancient town, together with the 
remains of a temple, and some edifices. A few broken 
shafts of columns are still standing; and there are a 
number of deep wells cut in the rock^J The ruins of 
Medaba are about two miles in circumference. There 
are many remains of the walls of private houses con- 
structed with blocks of silex, but not a single edifice is 
standing. The chief object of interest is an immense 

* Burckhardt's Travels in Nubia, Introduction, p. S£. 

♦ Burck. Travels in Syria, u. 365. £ Ibid. 



130 MOAB. 

tank or cistern of hewn stones, " which, as there is no 
stream at Medaba," Burckhardt remarks, " might still be 
of use to the Bedouins, were the surrounding ground 
cleared of the rubbish to allow the water to flow into it ; 
hut such an undertaking is far heyond the views of the wan- 
dering Arabs" There is also the foundation of a temple 
built with large stones, and apparently of great antiquity, 
with two columns near it.* The ruins of Diban (Dibon) 
situated in the midst of a fine plain, are of considerable 
extent, but present nothing of interest-! The neighbour- 
ing hot wells, and the similarity of the name, identify 
the ruins of Myoun with Meon, or Beth Meon of Scrip- 
ture. J Of this ancient city, as well as of Araayr (Aroer), 
nothing is now remarkable but what is common to them 
with all the cities of Moab — their entire desolation. The 
extent of the ruins of Rabba (Rabbath Moab), formerly 
the residence of the kings of Moab, sufficiently proves its 
ancient importance, though no other object can be par- 
ticularized among the ruins except the remains of a 
palace or temple, some of the walls of which are still 
standing; a gate belonging to another building; and an 
insulated altar. There are many remains of private 
buildings, but none entire. There being no springs on 
the spot, the town had two birkets, the largest of which 
is cut entirely out of the rocky ground, together with 
many cisterns. $ 

Mount Nebo was completely barren when Burckhardt 
passed over it, and the site of the ancient city had not 
been ascertained. || Nebo is spoiled. 

While the ruins of all these cities still retain their 
ancient names, and are the most conspicuous amid the 
wide scene of general desolation, and while each of them 
was in like manner particularized in the visions of the 
prophet, they yet formed but a small number of the cities 
of Moab : and the rest are also, in similar verification of 
the prophecies, desolate, without any to dwell therein. 
None of the ancient cities of Moab now exist as tenanted 
by men. Kerek, which neither bears any resemblance 
in name to any of the cities of Moab which are men- 
tioned as existing in the time of the Israelites, nor 

* Burck. p. 366. Seetzen's Travels, p. 37. Captains Irby and Mangled 
Travels, p. 471. 

t Captains Irby and Mangles's Travels, p. 462. Seetzen's Travels, p. 38. . 
t Burckliardt's Travels, p. 365. Irby and Mangles's Travels, p. 464. 
§ Seetzen's Travels, p. 39. Burckkardt's Travels, p. 377. 
ij Burckhardt's Travels, p. 370. 



MOAB 131 

possesses any monuments which denote a very remote 
antiquity, is the only nominal town in the whole country, 
and, in the words of Seetzen, who visited it, " in its 
present ruined state it can only be called a hamlet :" 
" and the houses have only one floor."* But the most 
populous and fertile province in Europe (especially any 
situated in the interior of a country like Moab) is not 
covered so thickly with towns as Moab is plentiful in 
ruins, deserted and desolate though now it be. Burck- 
hardt enumerates about fifty ruined sites within its boun- 
daries, many of them extensive. In general they are a 
broken down and undistinguishable mass of ruins ; and 
many of them have not been closely inspected. But, in 
some instances, there are the remains of temples, sepul- 
chral monuments, the ruins of edifices constructed of very 
large stones, in one of which buildings " some of the 
stones are twenty feet in length, and so broad that one 
constitutes the thickness of the wall ;" traces of hanging 
gardens ; entire columns lying on the ground, three feet 
in diameter, and fragments of smaller columns ; and 
many cisterns cut out of the rock. — When the towns of 
Moab existed in their prime, and were at ease, — when 
arrogance, and haughtiness, and pride prevailed among 
them — the desolation and total desertion and abandon- 
ment of them all must have utterly surpassed all human 
conception. And that such numerous cities — which sub- 
sisted for many ages — which were diversified in their 
sites, some of them being built on eminences, and natu 
rally strong; others on plains, and surrounded by the 
richest soil ; some situated in valleys by the side of a 
plentiful stream; and others where art supplied the defi- 
ciencies of nature, and where immense cisterns were ex- 
cavated out of the rock — and which exhibit in their 
ruins many monuments of ancient prosperity, and many 
remains easily convertible into present utility — should 
have all fled away — all met the same indiscriminate fate 
— and be all desolate, ivithout any to dwell therein, not- 
withstanding all these ancient assurances of their per- 
manent durability, and their existing facilities and induce- 
ments for being the habitations of men — is a matter of 
just wonder in the present day, — and had any other 
people been the possessors of Moab, the fact would 
either have been totally img^ssible or unaccountable, 

* Burckhardt's Travels, p. 333. Seetzen's Travels, p. 39 



132 MOAB 

Trying as this test of the truth of prophecy is — that is 
the word of God, and not of erring man, which can so 
well and so triumphantly abide it. They shall cry of 
Moab, Hoiv is it broken down I 

The valley also shall perish, and the plain shall be destroyed. 
Moab has often been a field of contest between the Arabs 
and the Turks ; and although the former have retained 
possession of it, both have mutually reduced it to deso- 
lation. The different tribes of Arabs who traverse it, 
not only bear a permanent and habitual hostility to Chris- 
tians and to Turks, but one tribe is often at variance 
and at war with another ; and the regular cultivation of 
the soil, or the improvement of those natural advantages 
of which the country is so full, is a matter either never 
thought of, or that cannot be realized. Property is there 
the creature of power, and not of law ; and possession 
forms no security when plunder is the preferable right. 
Hence the extensive plains, where they are not partially 
covered with wood, present a barren aspect, which is 
only relieved at intervals by a few clusters of wild fig- 
trees, that show how the richest gifts of nature degene- 
rate when unaided by the industry of man. And instead 
of the profusion which the plains must have exhibited in 
every quarter, nothing but " patches of the best soil in 
the territory are now cultivated by the Arabs ;" and these 
only " whenever they have the prospect of being able 
to secure the harvest against the incursions of enemies."* 
The Arab herds now roam at freedom over the valleys 
and the plains ; and " the many vestiges of field enclo- 
sures"! form not any obstruction; they wander undis- 
turbed around the tents of their masters, over the face 
of the country; and while the valley is perished* and the 
plain destroyed, the cities also of Aroer are forsaken ; they 
are for flocks ivhich lie doicn, and none make them afraid. 

The strong contrast between the ancient and the 
actual state of Moab is exemplified in the condition of 
the inhabitants as well as of the land ; and the coinci- 
dence between the prediction and the fact is as striking 
in the one case as in the other. 

The days come, saith the Lord, that I will send unto him 
(Moab) wanderers that shall cause him to ivander, and shall 
empty his vessels. The Bedouin (wandering) Arabs are 
now the chief and almost ftfe only inhabitants of a coun 

* Burekhardt's Travels in Syria, p. 369 i Ibid p 365 



MOAB. 133 

try once studded with cities. Traversing the country, 
and fixing their tents for a short time in one place, and 
then decamping to another, depasturing every part suc- 
cessively, and despoiling the whole land of its natural pro- 
duce, they are wanderers who have come up against it, and 
who keep it in a state of perpetual desolation* They lead a 
wandering life ; and the only regularity they know or 
practise is to act upon a systematic scheme of spoliation. 
They prevent any from forming a fixed settlement who 
are inclined to attempt it ; for although the fruitfulness 
of the soil would abundantly repay the labour of settlers, 
and render migration wholly unnecessary, even if the 
population were increased more than tenfold, yet the 
Bedouins forcibly deprive them of the means of subsist- 
ence, compel them to search for it elsewhere, and, in the 
words of the prediction, literally cause them to wander. 
" It may be remarked generally of the Bedouins," says 
Burckhardt, in describing their extortions in this very 
country, " that wherever they are the masters of the cul- 
tivators, the latter are soon reduced to beggary by their 
unceasing demands."* 

O ye that divell in Moah, leave the cities and dwell in the 
rock, and be like the dove that maketh her nest in the sides 
of the hole's mouth. In a general description of the con- 
dition of the inhabitants of that extensive desert which 
now occupies the place of these ancient flourishing states, 
Volney, in plain but unmeant illustration of this predic- 
tion, remarks, that the " wretched peasants live in per- 
petual dread of losing the fruit of their labours : and no 
sooner have they gathered in their harvest, than they 
hasten to secrete it in private places, and retire among 
the rocks which border on the Dead Sea."f Towards 
the opposite extremity of the land of Moab, and at a little 
distance from its borders, Seetzen relates, that " there 
are many families living in caverns;" and he actually 
designates them " the inhabitants of the rocks." J And 
at the distance of a few miles from the ruined site of 
Heshbon, " there are many artificial caves in a large range 
of perpendicular cliffs — in some of which are chambers 
and small sleeping apartments."^ While the cities are 
desolate, without any to dwell therein, the rocks are 

* Burckhardt's Travels in Syria, p. 381. 

t Volney's Travels, vol. ii. p. 344. 

% Seetzen's Travels, p. 20. See Monthly Review, vol. lxxi. p. 405. 

§ Captains Jrby and Mangles's Travels, p. 473. 

12 



134 MOAB. 

enanted. But whether flocks lie down in the former 
without any to make them afraid, or whether men are to 
be found dwelling in the latter, and are like the dove that 
maketh her nest in the sides of the hole's mouth — the 
wonderful transition, in either case, and the close accord- 
ance, in both, of the fact to the prediction, assuredly 
mark it in characters that may be visible to the purblind 
mind, as the word of that God before whom the darkness 
of futurity is as light, and without whom a sparrow can- 
not fall unto the ground.* 

And although chargeable with the impropriety of being 
somewhat out of place, it may not be here altogether im- 
proper to remark, that, demonstrative as all these clear 
predictions and coincident facts are of the inspiration of 
the Scriptures, it cannot but be gratifying to every lover 
of his kind, when he contemplates that desolation caused 
by many sins and fraught with many miseries, which the 
wickedness of man has wrought, and which the prescience 
of God revealed, to know that all these prophecies, while 
they mingle the voice of wailing with that of denuncia- 
tion, are the word of that God who, although he surfers 
not iniquity to pass unpunished, overrules evil for good, 
and makes the wrath of man to praise him, and who in 
the midst of judgment can remember mercy. And rea- 
soning merely from the " uniform experience" (to borrow 
a term and draw an argument from Hume) of the truth 
of the prophecies already fulfilled, the unprejudiced mind 
will at once perceive the full force of the proof derived 

* Another prediction respecting the dwellers in Moab ought not perhaps to 
be passed over in silence, although the terms in which it is expressed are not 
so clear and unambiguous as those to which the observations in the text are 
confined, and although it may have met its primary fulfilment in a much earlier 
age. Yet it is so intelligible, that the fact, to which it bears an unstrained 
application, may be left as its sole and adequate exposition ; and the continued 
truth of the prophecy greatly strengthens, instead of weakening, the evidence 
of its inspiration. And how is Moab broken down and spoiled, when, in lieu 
of the arrogancy and exceeding pride and haughtiness of its ancient inhabitants, 
the following description is characteristic of the wanderers who now possess 
it. " In the valley of Wale," which is situated in the immediate vicinity of the 
river Arnon into which the Wale flows, Burckhardt observed " a large party 
of Arabs Sherarat encamped — Bedouins of the Arabian desert, who resort 
hither in summer for pasturage." Being oppressed and hemmed in by other 
Arab tribes, '" they wander about in misery, have very few horses, and are not 
able to feed any flocks of sheep or goats. — Their tents are very miserable ; 
both men and women go almost naked, the former being only covered round 
the waist, and the women wearing nothing but. a loose shirt hanging in ra 
about them." Moab shall be a derision. As the wandering bird, cast out of 
th£ nest, so the daughters of Moab shall be at the ford of Arnon. — Burckhardf/s 
Travels, p. 370, 371 Isa. xvi. 2. 



IDTTMEA. 135 

from experience,* and acknowledge that it would be 
rejection of the authority of reason as well as of revela- 
tion to mistrust the truth of that prophetic amrmation 
of resuscitating and redeeming import, respecting Am- 
nion and Moab, which is the last of the series, and which 
alone now awaits futurity to stamp it with the brilliant 
and crowning zeal of its testimony. " I w r ill bring again 
the captivity of Moab in the latter days, saith the Lord.f 
I will bring again the captivity of the children of Amnion, 
saith the Lord. J The remnant of my people shall pos- 
sess them.§ They shall build the old wastes, they shall 
raise up the former desolations, and they shall repair the 
waste cities, the desolations of many generations."|| 

IDUMEA. 

But a heavier and irreversible doom was denounced 
against the land of Edom or Idumea ; and the testimony 
of an infidel was the first to show how it has been realized : 
that testimony, as forming an exposition of itself, may, 
in a primary view of them, be subjoined to the prophe- 
cies, and must have its due influence on every unbiassed 
mind. There are numerous prophecies respecting Idu- 
mea that bear a literal interpretation, however hyper- 
bolical they may appear. " (My sword shall come down 
upon Idumea, and upon the people of my curse to judg- 
ment.) — From generation to generation it shall lie waste, 
none shall pass through it for ever and ever. But the 
cormorant and the bittern shall possess it ; the owl also 
and the raven shall dwell in it : and he shall stretch out 
upon it the line of confusion and the stones of emptiness. 
They shall call the nobles thereof to the kingdom, but 
none shall be there, and all her princes shall be nothing. 
And thorns shall come up in her palaces, nettles and 
brambles in the fortresses thereof; and it shall be a habi- 
tation of dragons, and a court for owls. The wild beasts 
of the desert shall also meet with the wild beasts of the 
island, and the satyr (or hairy creature) shall cry to his 
fellow; the screech-owl also shall rest there, and find 
for herself a place of rest. There shall the great owl 

* " Being determined by custom to transfer the past to the future, in all our 
inferences; where the past has been entirely regular and uniform, we expect 
trie event with the greatest assurance, and leave no room for any contrary 
supposition."— Hume's Essays of Probability, vol, ii. p. 61. Edin. 1800. 

t .ler. xlviii. 47. i Jer. jrlix. § Zeph. ii. 9. 

H Isa. Lxi. 4; lviii. 11 Eaek. xxsyi. 33, 36. 



136 IDUMEA. 

make her nest, and lay, and hatch, and gather under her 
shadow ; there shall the vultures also be gathered every 
one with her mate. Seek ye out of the book of the Lord 
and read ; no one of these shall fail, none shall want her 
mate ; for my mouth it hath commanded, and his spirit it 
hath gathered them. And he hath cast the lot for them, 
and his hand hath divided it unto them by line ; they shall 
possess it for ever, from generation to generation shall 
they dwell therein."* " Concerning Edom, thus saith 
the Lord of Hosts : Is wisdom no more in Teman 1 Is 
counsel perished from the prudent 1 I will bring the 
calamity of Esau upon him the time that I will visit him. 
If grape-gatherers come to thee, would they not leave 
some gleaning grapes] if thieves by night, they will 
destroy till they have enough. But I have made Esau 
bare, I have uncovered his secret places, and he shall not 
be able to hide himself. Behold they whose judgment 
was not to drink of the cup have assuredly drunken ; and 
art thou he that shalt altogether go unpunished 1 Thou 
shalt not go unpunished, but thou shalt surely drink of it. 
— I have sworn by myself, saith the Lord, that Bozrah 
(the strong or fortified city) shall become a desolation, 
a reproach, a waste, and a curse ; and all the cities 
thereof shall be perpetual wastes. Lo, I will make thee 
small among the heathen, and despised among men. Thy 
terribleness hath deceived thee, and the pride of thine 
heart, O thou that dwellest in the clefts of the rock, that 
holdest the height of the hill : though thou shouldst make 
thy nest as high as the eagle, I will bring thee down from 
thence, saith the Lord. Also Edom shall be a desolation ; 
every one that goeth by shall be astonished, and shall 
hiss at all the plagues thereof. As in the overthrow of 
Sodom and Gomorrah, and the neighbour cities thereof, 
saith the Lord, no man shall abide there, neither shall a 
son of man dwell in it."f " Thus saith the Lord God, I 
will stretch out mine hand upon Edom, and will cut off 
man and beast from it, and I will make it desolate from 
Fenian." " The word of the Lord came unto me, saying, 
bon of man, set thy face against Mount Seir, and pro- 
phesy against it, and say unto it, Thus saith the Lore 
God, I will stretch out mine hand against thee, and I will 
make thee most desolate. I will lay thy cities waste, 
aid thou shalt be desolate. "J Thus will I make Mount 

Isaiah xxxiv. 5 10-17. j Jer. xlix. 7-10, 12-18. i Ezek. xxxv. 1, 2, 3, 4. 



IDUMEA. 137 

Seir most desolate, and cut off from it him that passeth 
out, and him that retumeth.* I will make thee perpetual 
desolations, and thy cities shall not return.f When the 
whole earth rejoiceth, I will make thee desolate. Thou 
shalt be desolate, O Mount Seir, and all Idumea, even all 
of it ; and they shall know that I am the Lord. J Edom 
shall be a desolate wilderness. § " For three transgres- 
sions of Edom, and for four, I will not turn away the 
punishment thereof."|| " Thus saith the Lord concern- 
ing Edom, I have made thee small among the heathen, 
thou art greatly despised. The pride of thine heart hath 
deceived thee, thou that dwellest in the clefts of the rock, 
whose habitation is high. Shall I not destroy the wise 
men out of Edom, and understanding out of the Mount 
of Esau] The house of Jacob shall possess their pos- 
sessions, but there shall not be any remaining of the house 
of Esau.^f I laid the mountains of Esau and his herit- 
age waste for the dragons of the wilderness. Whereas 
Edom saith we are impoverished, but we will return and 
build the desolate places ; thus saith the Lord of Hosts, 
they shall build, but I will throw down ; and they shall 
call them the border of wickedness."** Is there any 
country once inhabited and opulent so utterly desolate ? 
There is, and that land is Idumea. The territory of the 
descendants of Esau affords as miraculous a demonstra- 
tion of the inspiration of the Scriptures, as the fate of 
the children of Israel. 

Idumea was situated to the south of Judea and of Moab ; 
it bordered on the east with Arabia Petraea, under which 
name it was included in the latter part of its history, and 
it extended southward to the eastern gulf of the Red 
Sea. A single extract from the Travels of Volney will 
be found to be equally illustrative of the prophecy and 
of the fact. " This country has not been visited by any 
traveller, but it well merits such an attention ; for from 
the reports of the Arabs of Bakir, and the inhabitants 
of Gaza, who frequently go to Maan and Karak, on the 
road of the pilgrims, there are, to the south-east of the 
lake Asphaltites (Dead Sea), ivithin three days' journey, 
upwards of thirty ruined towns absolutely deserted. Seve- 
ral of them have large edifices, with columns that may 
have belonged to the ancient temples, or at least to 

* Ezek. xxxv. 7. t lb- 9. ' J lb. 14, 15. $ Joel iii. 19. 

H Amos i. 11. IT Obad. v. 2, 3, 8, 17, 18. ** Malachi 1. 3, i. 

12* 



138 IDUMEA. 

Greek churches. The Arabs sometimes make use of 
them to fold their cattle in ; but in general avoid them on 
account of the enormous scorpions with which they 
swarm. We cannot be surprised at these traces of 
ancient population, when we recollect that this was the 
country of the Nabatheans, the most powerful of the 
Arabs, and of the Idumeans, who, at the time of the de~ 
struction of Jerusalem, were almost as numerous as the 
Jews, as appears from Josephus, who informs us, that on 
the first rumour of the march of Titus against Jerusalem, 
thirty thousand Idumeans instantly assembled, and threw 
themselves into that city for its defence. It appears that, 
besides the advantages of being under a tolerably good 
government, these districts enjoyed a considerable share 
of the commerce of Arabia and India, which increased 
their industry and population. We know that as far 
back as the time of Solomon, the cities of Astioum Gaber 
(Esion Gaber) and Ailah (Eloth) were highly-frequented 
marts. These towns were situated on the adjacent gulf 
of the Red Sea, where we still find the latter yet retain 
ing its name, and perhaps the former in that of El Akaba, 
or the end (of the sea). These two places are in the 
hands of the Bedouins, who, being destitute of a navy 
and commerce, do not inhabit them. But the pilgrims 
report that there is at El Akaba a wretched fort. The 
Idumeans, from whom the Jews only took their ports at 
intervals, must have found in them a great source of 
wealth and population. It even appears that the Idu- 
means rivalled the Tyrians, who also possessed a town, 
the name of which is unknown, on the coast of Hedjaz, 
in the desert of Tih, and the city of Faran, and, without 
doubt, El-Tor, which served it by way of port. From 
this place the caravans might reach Palestine and Judea 
(through Idumea) in eight or ten days. This route, 
which is longer than that from Suez to Cairo, is infinitely 
shorter than that from Aleppo to Bassorah."* Evidence 
which must have been undesigned, which cannot be sus- 
pected of partiality, and which no illustration can 
strengthen, and no ingenuity pervert, is thus borne to 
the truth of the most wonderful prophecies. That the 
Idumeans were a populous and powerful nation long 
posterior to the delivery of the prophecies ; that they pos- 
sessed a tolerably good government (even in the estimation 

* Volney's Travels, vol. ii. p. 344-6. 



IDUMEA. 139 

of Volney) ; that Idumea contained many cities ; that 
these cities are now absolutely deserted, and that their 
ruins swarm with enormous scorpions ; that it was a 
commercial nation, and possessed highly-frequented 
marts ; that it forms a shorter route than an ordinary 
one to India, and yet that it had not been visited by any 
traveller, are facts all recorded, or proved to a wish, by 
this able but unconscious commentator. 

A greater contrast cannot be imagined than the an- 
cient and present state of Idumea. It was a kingdom 
previous to Israel, having been governed first by dukes 
or princes, afterward by eight successive kings, and 
again by dukes, before there reigned any king over the 
children of Israel.* Its fertility and early cultivation 
are implied, not only in the blessings of Esau, whose 
dwelling was to be the fatness of the earth, and of the 
dew of heaven from above, but also in the condition 
proposed by Moses to the Edomites, when he solicited a 
passage for the Israelites through their borders, " that they 
would not pass through the fields nor through the vine- 
yards ; and also in the great wealth, especially in the multi- 
tudes of flocks and herds, recorded as possessed by an indi- 
vidual inhabitant of that country, at a period, in all proba- 
bility, even more remote. f The Idumeans were, without 
doubt, both an opulent and a powerful people. They often 
contended with the Israelites, and entered into a league 
with their other enemies against them. In the reign of 
David they were indeed subdued and greatly oppressed, 
and many of them even dispersed throughout the neigh- 
bouring countries, particularly Phoenicia and Egypt. 
But during the decline of the kingdom of Judah, and for 
many years previous to its extinction, they encroached 
upon the territories of the Jews, and extended their do- 
minion over the south-western part of Judea. Though 
no excellence whatever be now attached to its name, 
which exists only in past history, Idumea, including per- 
haps Judea, was then not without the praise of the first 
of Roman poets. 

Primus Idumeas referam tibi, Mantua, palmas. 

Virg. Georg. lib. iii. 1. 12. 

And of Luc an (Phars. lib. iii.) 

Arbustis palmarum dives Idume. 
* Genesis xxxvi, 31, &c. f Genesis xxvii 39. Numbers xx: 17. Job xlii 12. 



140 IDUMEA. 

But Idumea, as a kingdom, can lay claim to a higher 
renown than either the abundance of its flocks or the 
excellence of its palm-trees. The celebrated city of 
Petra (so named by the Greeks, and so worthy of the 
name, on account both of its rocky vicinity and its nu- 
merous dwellings excavated from the rocks) was situ- 
ated within the patrimonial territory of the Edomites. 
There is distinct and positive evidence that it was a city 
of Edom,* and the metropolis of the Nabatheans,f whom 
Strabo expressly identifies with the Idumeans — pos- 
sessors of the same country, and subject to the same 
laws.f " Petra," to use the words of Dr. Vincent, by 
whom the state of its ancient commerce was described 
before its ruins were discovered, " is the capital of Edom 
or Seir, the Idumea or Arabia Petraea of the Greeks, 
the Nabatea, considered both by geographers, historians, 
and poets as the source of all the precious commodities 
of the east."§ " The caravans, in all ages, from Minea 
in the interior of Arabia, and from G-errha on the Gulf 
of Persia, from Hadramaut on the ocean, and some 
even from Sabea or Yemen, appear to have pointed to 
Petra as a common centre ; and from Petra the trade 
seems to have again branched out in every direction to 
Egypt, Palestine, and Syria, through Arsinoe, Gaza, 
Tyre, Jerusalem, Damascus, and a variety of subordinate 
routes that all terminated on the Mediterranean. There 
is every proof that is requisite to show that the Tyrians 
and Sidonians were the first merchants who introduced 
the produce of India to all the nations which encircled 
the Mediterranean, so is there the strongest evidence to 
prove that the Tyrians obtained all their commodities 
from Arabia. But if Arabia was the centre of this com- 
merce, Petra|| was the point to which all the Arabians 
tended from the three sides of their vast peninsula."^ 
At a period subsequent to the commencement of the 

* Petra being afterward more particularly noticed, some quotations from an- 
cient authors respecting it may here be subjoined. 

Uirpa rroXtg iv yr\ E<5a>// rrjg ' KpaSiag. — Eusebii Onomast: 
Petra, ci vitas Arabiae in terra Edom. — Hieron. 
Vide Relandi Palestina, torn. i. p. 70. 

t Mt]TPotto\ls <5s to)v NaBaTaiiov caivrjUerpa Ka\ovfievtj. 

Strabo, lib. xvi. p. 779 Ed: Pans, 1620. 
$ Na&zratot Se ticiv hi iSy/xaioi — Ibid. p. 760. 
§ Vincent's Commerce of the Ancients, vol: xi. p. 263 
\\ Agatharchides Huds. p. 57. Pliny, lib. vi: c. 28, quoted bv Vincent. Ihio. 
p. 262. ff Ibid. p. 260, 261, 262. 



XDUMEA. ] 4 1 

Christian era, there always reigned at Petra, according 
to Strabo, a king of the royal lineage, with whom a 
prince was associated in the government.* It was a 
place of great strength in the time of the Romans. — 
Pompey marched against it, but desisted from the attack : 
and Trajan afterward besieged it. It was a metropoli- 
tan see, to which several bishoprics were attached in 
the time of the Greek emperors, and Idumea was in- 
cluded in the third Palestine — Palestina tertia sive saluta- 
ris. But the ancient state of Idumea cannot in the 
present day be so clearly ascertained from the records 
respecting it which can be gleaned from history, whether 
sacred or profane, as by the wonderful and imperishable 
remains of its capital city, and by " the traces of many 
towns and villages," which indisputably show that it 
must once have been thickly inhabited.! It not only 
can admit of no dispute that the country and cities of 
Idumea subsisted in a very different state from that ab- 
solute desolation in which, long prior to the period of 
its reality, it was represented in the prophetic vision ; 
but there are prophecies regarding it that have yet a 
prospective view, and which refer to the time when " the 
children of Israel shall possess their possessions," or to 
" the year of recompenses for the controversy of Zion." 
But, dangerous as it is to explore the land of Idumea, 
and difficult to ascertain those existing facts and precise 
circumstances which form the strongest features of its 
desolate aspect (and that ought to be the subject of 
scientific as well as of religious inquiry), enough has 
been discovered to show that the sentence against it, 
though fulfilled by the agency of nature and of man, is 
precisely such as was first recorded in the annals of in- 
spiration. 

There is a prediction which, being peculiarly remark- 
able as applicable to Idumea, and bearing reference to a 
circumstance explanatory of the difficulty of access to 
any knowledge respecting it, is entitled, in the first in- 
stance, to notice. None shall pass through it for ever and 
ever, — Iivillcut off from Mount Seir him that passeth out 
and him that returneth.% The ancient greatness of Idumea 
must, in no small degree, have resulted from its com- 

* Strabo, p: 779. t Burckhardt's Travels in Syria, p: 436: 

% Isaiah xxxiv. 10. Ezek. xxxv. 7. The first of these predictions is con- 
joined with others, the period of whose full completion — the year of recom- 
penses for the controversy of Zion— is yet to come. 



142 IDUMEA. 

merce. Bordering with Arabia on the east, and Egypt 
on the south-west, and forming from north to south the 
most direct and most commodious channel of communi- 
cation between Jerusalem and her dependencies on the 
Red Sea, as well as between Syria aM India (through 
the continuous valleys of El Ghor and El Araba, which 
terminated on the one extremity at the borders of 
Judea, and on the other at Elath and Esiongaber on the 
Elanitic gulf of the Red Sea), Idumea may be said to 
have formed the emporium of the commerce of the east. 
A Roman road passed directly through Idumea, from 
Jerusalem to Akaba, and another from Akaba to Moab ;* 
and when these roads were made, at a time long pos- 
terior to the date of the predictions, the conception could 
not have been formed, or held credible by man, that the 
period would ever arrive when none would pass through 
it. Above seven hundred years after the date of the 
prophecy, Strabo relates, that " many Romans and other 
foreigners" were found at Petra by his friend Athenodo- 
rus, the philosopher, who visited it.f The prediction is 
yet more surprising when viewed in conjunction with 
another, which implies that travellers would pass by 
Idumea, — every one that goeth by shall be astonished. 
And the hadj routes (routes of the pilgrims) from Da- 
mascus and from Cairo to Mecca, the one on the east 
and the other towards the south of Idumea, along the 
whole of its extent, go by it, or touch partially on its 
borders, without passing through it. The truth of the pro- 
phecy (though hemmed in thus by apparent impossibili- 
ties and contradictions, and with extreme probability of 
its fallacy in every view that could have been visible to 
man) may yet be tried. 

The words of the prediction might well be understood 
as merely implying that Idumea would cease to be a 
thoroughfare for the commerce of the nations which ad- 
joined it, and that its " highly- frequented marts" would 
be forsaken as centres of intercourse and traffic ; and 
easy would have been the task of demonstrating its truth 
in this limited sense, which skepticism itself ought not 
to be unwilling to authorize. Bat the fact to which it 
refers forbids that the prophecy should be limited to a 
general interpretation, and demands that it be literall}) 
understood and applied. The fact itself being of a nega- 

* Map in Burckhardt's Travels. 

I Ho Wo is n&v Fo)ixouo)v, ttoWois 8s icai TOiv a\) ov \evoiv. — Strabo, ]\ 779. 



IDUMEA. 143 

tive nature, requires a more minute investigation and 
detail than any mattar of observation or discovery that 
is proveable at once by a simple description. And in- 
stead of merely citing authorities in affirmation of it, 
evidence, as remarkable as the prediction, and at once 
the most undesigned and conclusive, shall be largely ad- 
duced to establish its truth. 

The remark of Volney, who passed at a distance to 
the west of Idumea, and who received his information 
from the Arabs in that quarter, " that it had not been 
visited by any traveller," will not be unobserved by the 
attentive reader. Soon after Burckhardt had entered, 
on the north-east, the territories of the Edomites, the 
boundary of which he distinctly marks, he says, that 
"he was without protection in the midst of a desert, 
where no traveller had ever before been seen.* It was 
then " that for the first time he had ever felt fear during 
his travels in the desert, and his route thither was the 
most dangerous he had ever travelled."! Mr. Joliffe, 
who visited the northern shore of the Dead Sea, in allud- 
ing to the country south of its opposite extremity, de- 
scribes it as " one of the wildest and most dangerous 
divisions of Arabia," and says that any research in that 
quarter was impracticable. J Sir Frederick Henniker, in 
his Notes dated from Mount Sinai, on the south of Idu- 
mea, unconsciously concentrates striking evidence in 
verification of the prediction, while he states a fact that 
would seem, at first sight, to militate against it. " Seet- 
zen, on a vessel of paper pasted against the wall, noti- 
fies his having penetrated the country in a direct line 
between the Dead Sea and Mount Sinai" (through Idu- 
mea), " a route never before accomplished.^ This was the 
more interesting to me, as I had previously determined 
to attempt the same, it being the shortest way to Jerusa- 
lem. The Cavaliere Frediani, whom I met in Egypt, 
would have persuaded me that it was impracticable, and 
that he, having had the same intention himself, after/ 
having been detained in hope five weeks, was compelled 
to relinquish his design. While I was yet ruminating 
over this scrap of paper, the superior paid me a morning 
visit ; he also said it was impossible ; but at length prom- 

* Burckhardt's Syria, p. 421. t Ibid p. 400. 

t Letters from Palestine, vol. i. p. 129. 

§ The words upon the paper itself are, " Entre la ville d'Hebron et entre le 
Mont Sinai, par un chemin justiu'a ce terns la iticoRnu."— Burck. Syr. p. 553. 



144 IDUMEA. 

ised to search for guides. I had already endeavoured 
to persuade those who had accompanied me from Tor, 
but they also talked of dangers, and declined."* Guides 
were found, who, after resisting for a while his entreat- 
ies and bribes, agreed to conduct him by the desired 
route; but, unable to overcome their fears, deceived 
him, and led him towards the Mediterranean coast, 
through the desert to Gaza. 

There yet remains a detail of the complication of dif- 
ficulties w T hich, in another direction still, the nearest to 
Judea, and apparently the most accessible, the traveller 
has to encounter in reaching that desolate region which 
once formed the kingdom of Idumea, — difficulties that it 
may safely be said are scarcely to be met with in any 
other part of Asia, or even in any other quarter of the 
world where no natural obstructions intervene. " To 
give an idea," say Captains Irby and Mangles, " of the 
difficulties which the Turkish government supposed there 
would be for an Englishman to go to Kerek and Wady 
Mousa, it is necessary to say, that when Mr. Banks ap- 
plied at Constantinople to have these places inserted in 
his firman, they returned for answer, " that they knew 
of none such within the grand seignor's dominions;! 
but as he and Mr. Frere, the British minister, pressed the 
affair very much, they at length referred him to the 
Pasha of Damascus, who (equally averse to have any 
thing to do with the business) passed him on to the Gov- 
ernor of Jerusalem."! The Governor of Jerusalem, 
"having tried all he could to dissuade them from the 
undertaking," referred them in like manner to the Gov- 
ernor of Jaffa, who not only " evaded the affair alto- 
gether," but endeavoured to put a stop to their journey. 
Though frustrated in every attempt to obtain any pro- 
tection or assistance from the public authorities, and also 
warned of the danger that awaited them from " Arabs 
of a most savage and treacherous race," these adventu- 
rous travellers, intent on visiting the ruins of Petra, 
having provided themselves with horses and arms, and 
Arab dresses, and being eleven in number, including ser- 
vants and two guides, " determined to proceed to try 
their fortune with the Sheikh of Hebron." He at first 
expressed compliance with their wishes, but being soon 
" alarmed at his own determination," refused them tlie 

* Sir Frederick Henniker's Travels, p. 223, 224. 

t Captains Irby and Mangles's Travels, p. 336. J Ibid. p. 337. 



IDUMEA. 1 45 

least aid or protection. Repeated offers of money to 
guides met a decided refusal; and they procured no 
means of facilitating their journey.* The peculiar dif- 
ficulty, not only of passing through Idumea (which they 
never attempted), but even of entering within its borders, 
and the greater hazard of travelling thither than in any 
other direction, are still further illustrated by the acqui- 
escence of an Arab tribe afterward to accompany and 
protect them to Kerek, at a reasonable rate, and by their 
positive refusal, upon any terms or stipulation whatever, 
to conduct them to a spot that lay within the boundaries 
of Edom. "We offered five hundred piastres if they 
would conduct us to Wady Mousa, but nothing could induce 
them to consent. They said they would not go if we 
would give them five thousand piastres" (forty times the 
sum for which they had agreed to accompany them to 
Kerek, although the distance was not nearly double), 
" observing that money was of no use to a man if he lost 
his life."f Having afterward obtained the protection of 
an intrepid Arab chief, with his followers, and having 
advanced to the borders of Edom, their farther progress 
was suddenly opposed in the most threatening and deter- 
mined manner. And in the whole course of their travels, 
which extended to about three thousand miles, in Thrace, 
Asia Minor, Cyprus, the desert, Egypt, and in Syria, in 
different longitudinal and lateral directions, from one ex- 
tremity to the other, they found nowhere such a barrier 
to their progress, except in a previous abortive attempt 
to reach Petra from another quarter ; and though they 
were never better prepared for encountering it, they 
never elsewhere experienced so formidable an opposi- 
tion. The Sheikh of Wady Mousa and his people swore 
that they w r ould not suffer them to go forward, and " that 
they should neither drink of their water, nor pass into 
their territory" The Arab chief wiio had espoused their 
cause also took an oath, " by the faith of a true Mus- 
sulman," that they should drink of the water of Wady 
Mousa, and go whithersoever he pleased to carry them. 
" Thus," it is remarked, " were both the rival chiefs op- 
positely pledged in their resolutions respecting us." 

Several da} r s were passed in entreaties, artifices, and 
mutual menaces, w r hich were all equally unavailing. — 
The determination and perseverance of the one party of 

* Macmichael's Journey to Constantinople in 1818, Append, p. 199. 
t Captains Irby and Mangles's Travels, p. 3i9. 

13 G 



] 48 IBI7MEA. 

Arabs was equalled b/ the resistance and obstinacy of 
the other. Both were constantly acquiring an accession 
of strength, and actively preparing for combat. The 
travellers, thus finding all the dangers and difficulties of 
which they had been forewarned fully realized, " could 
not but compare their case to that of the Israelites under 
Moses, lohen Edom refused to give them a passage through 
his country"* " They offered even to abandon their ob- 
ject rather than proceed to extremities," and endanger 
the lives of many others, as well as their own; and they 
were told that they were fortunate in the protection of 
the chief who accompanied them, otherwise they never 
would have returned. The hostile Arabs, who defied 
them and their protectors to approach, having abandoned 
their camps, and having concentrated their forces, and 
possessed themselves of the passes and heights, sent mes- 
sengers with a renewal of oaths and protestations against 
entering their territory ; announced that they were fully 
prepared to maintain their purpose — that war " was posi- 
tively determined on as the only alternative of the trav- 
ellers' not being permitted to see what they desired :"t 
and their sheikh vowed that " if they passed through his 
lands, they should be shot like so many dogs."i Abou 
Raschid,the firm and fearless chief who had pledged his 
honour and his oath in guarantee for the advance of the 
travellers, and whose obstinate resolution nothing could 
exceed, his arguments, artifices, and falsehoods having 
all failed, despatched messengers to the camps under his 
influence, rejected alike all compromise with the oppo- 
sing Arabs, and all remonstrances on the part of his ad- 
herents and dependants (who thought that the travellers 
were doomed to destruction by their rashness), and re- 
solved to achieve by force what he had sworn to accom- 
plish. "The camp assumed a very warlike appearance ; 
the spears stuck in the sand, the saddled horses before 
the tents, with the arms hanging up within, altogether 
had an imposing effect. The travellers, however, were 
at last permitted to proceed in peace : but a brief space 
was allowed them for inspecting the ruins, and they 
could plainly distinguish the opposing party of Arabs, in 
great numbers, watching them from the heights. Abou 
Raschid was then dismayed, " he was never at his ease, 



* Captains Irby and Mangles's Travels, p. 392. f Ibid. 
t Macmichael's Journey to Constantinople, p. 218. 



IDUMEA. 147 

and constantly urged them to depart." Nothing could 
obtain an extension of the time allotted them, and they 
returned, leaving much unexplored, and even unable by 
any means or possibility to penetrate a little farther, in 
order to visit a large temple which they could clearly 
discern. Through Idumea they did not pass. 

Thus Voiney, Burckhardt, Joliffe, Henniker, and Cap- 
tains Irby and Mangles, not only give their personal 
testimony to the truth of the fact which corroborates the 
prediction, but also adduce a variety of circumstances, 
which all conspire in giving superfluity of proof that 
Idumea, which was long resorted to from every quarter, is 
so beset on every side with dangers to the traveller, that 
none pass through it. Even the Arabs of the neighbour- 
ing regions, whose home is the desert, and whose occu- 
pation is wandering, are afraid to enter it, or to conduct 
any within its borders. Yet amid all this manifold 
testimony to its truth, there is not, in any single instance, 
the most distant allusion to the prediction ; and the evi- 
dence is as unsuspicious and undesigned, as it is copious 
and complete.* 

Eclom shall he a desolation. From generation to genera- 
tion it shall lie waste, &c. Judea, Ammon, and Moab ex- 
hibit so abundantly the remains and the means of an 
exuberant fertility, that the wonder arises in the reflect- 
ing mind, how the barbarity of man could have so effect- 
ually counteracted for so " many generations" the prodi- 
gality of nature. But such is Edom's desolation, that 
the first sentiment of astonishment on the contemplation 
of it is, how a wide-extended region, now diversified by 
the strongest features of desert wildness, could ever 
have been adorned with cities, or tenanted for ages by 
a powerful and opulent people. Its present aspect would 
belie its ancient history, were not that history corrobo- 

* Not even the cases of two individuals, Seetzen and Burckhardt, can be 
stated as at all opposed to the literal interpretation of the prophecies. Seetzen 
did indeed pass through Idumea, and Burnkhardt traversed a considerable part 
of it. But the former met his death not long after the completion of his jour- 
ney through Idumea : the latter never recovered from the effects of the hard 
ships and privations which he suffered there, and without even commencing 
the exclusive design which he had in view (viz. to explore the interior of Africa>, 
to which all his journeyings in Asia were merely intended as preparatory, he 
died at Cairo. Neither of them lived to return to Europe. J will cut off from 
Mount Seir him that passeth out, and him that returneth. Strabo mentions 
that there was a direct road from Petra to Jericho, of three or four days' jour- 
ney. Cantains Irby and Mangles were eighteen days in reaching it from Jeru- 
salem. They did not pass through Idumea, and they did return. Seetzen and 
BurcVhardt did pass tin >ugh it, and they did not return. 

G2 



148 IDUMEA. 

rated by " the many vestiges of former cultivation," by 
the remains of walls and paved roads, and by the ruins 
of cities still existing in tins ruined country. 

The total cessation of its commerce — the artificial 
irrigation of its valleys wholly neglected — the destruction 
of all the cities, and the continued spoliation of the 
country by the Arabs while aught remained that they 
could destroy — the permanent exposure, for ages, of the 
soil, unsheltered by its ancient groves, and unprotected by 
any covering from the scorching rays of the sun — the un- 
obstructed encroachments of the desert, and of the drifted 
sands from the borders of the Red Sea, the consequent 
absorption of the water of the springs and streamlets 
during summer, are causes which have all combined their 
baneful operation in rendering Edom most desolate, the 
desolation of desolations. Volney's account is sufficiently 
descriptive of the desolation which now reigns over 
Idumea ; and the information which Seetzen derived at 
Jerusalem respecting it is of similar import.* He was 
told, that " at the distance of two days' journey and a half 
from Hebron he would find considerable ruins of the an- 
cient city of Abde, and that for all the rest of the jour- 
ney he would see no place of habitation ; he would meet 
only with a few tribes of wandering Arabs." From the 
borders of Edom Captains Irby and Mangles beheld a 
boundless extent of desert view, which they had hardly 
ever seen equalled for singularity and grandeur. And 
the following extract, descriptive of what Burckhardt 
actually witnessed in the different parts of Edom, cannot 
be more graphically abbreviated than in the words of the 
prophet. Of its eastern boundary, and of the adjoining 
part of Arabia Petraea, strictly so called, Burckhardt 
writes — " It might with truth be called Petraea, not only 
on account of its rocky mountains, but also of the ele- 
vated plain already described,! which is so much covered 
with stones, especially flints, that it may with great pro- 
priety be called a stony desert, although susceptible of 
cu] Lure ; in many places it is overgrown with wild herbs, 
and must once have been thickly inhabited; for the 
traces of many towns and villages are met with on both 
sides of the Hadj road, between Maan and Akaba, as 
well as between Maan and the plains of the Hauran, in 

* Seetzen's Travels, p. 46. 

t Shera (Seir) the territory of the Edomites, p. 410, 435. 



IDUMEA. 149 

which direction are also many springs. At present all this 
country is a desert, and Maan (Teman*) is the only in- 
habited place in it. I will stretch out my hand against thee, 
O Mount Seir, and will make thee most desolate, I will 
stretch out my hand upon Edom, and will make it desolate 
from Teman"] 

In the interior of Idumea, where the ruins of some of 
its ancient cities are still visible, and in the extensive 
valley which reaches from the Red to the Dead Sea — 
the -appearance of which must now be totally and sadly 
changed from what it was — " the whole plain presented 
to the view an expanse of shifting sands, whose surface 
was broken by innumerable undulations and low hills. — 
The same appears to have been brought from the shores 
of the Red Sea by the southern winds ; and the Arabs 
told me that the valleys continue to present the same ap- 
pearance beyond the latitude of Wady Mousa. In some 
parts of the valley the sand is very deep, and there is not 
the slightest appearance of a road, or of any work of hu- 
man art. A few trees grow among the sand-hills, but 
the depth of sand precludes all vegetation of herbage. "{ 
If grape-gatherers come to thee, would they not leave some 
gleaning grapes ? if thieves by night, they will destroy till 
they have enough ; but I have made Esau bare. Edom 
shall be a desolate wilderness. " On ascending the western 
plain, on a higher level than that of Arabia, we had be- 
fore us an immense expanse of dreary country, entirely 
covered with black flints, with here and there some hilly 
chain rising from the piain. ,? § / will stretch out upon 
Idumea the line of confusion, and the stones of emptiness. 

Of the remains of ancient cities still exposed to view 
in different places throughout Idumea, Burckhardt de- 
scribes " the ruins of a large town, of which nothing re- 
mains but broken walls and heaps of stones ; the ruins of 
several villages in its vicinity ;|| the ruins of an ancient 
city, consisting of large heaps of hewn blocks of silicious 
stone; the extensive ruins of Gherandel, Arindela, an 
ancient town of Palestina Tertia."lf " The following 
ruined places are situated in Djebal Shera (Mount Seir) to 
the S. and S. W. of Wady Mousa, — Kalaab, Djirba, Basta, 
Eyl, Ferdakh, Anyk, Bir el Beytar, Shemakh, and Syt 
Of the towns** laid down in D'Anville's map, Thoana ex 

* See Map prefixed to Burckhardt's Travels. t Ibid. p. 436. 

t Ibid. p. 442. § Ibid. p. 444. |j Ibid. p. 418. IT Ibid. p. 441 

** The names of these towns in the map referred to are, Elusa, Tamar*, 
13* 



150 IBUMEA. 

cepted, no traces remain."* / will lay thy cities waste, and 
thou shalt be desolate* O Mount Seir, I will make thee per- 
petual desolatio7is ; and thy cities shall not return. 

While the cities of Idumea, in general, are thus most 
desolate ; and while the ruins themselves are as indis- 
criminate as they are undefined in the prediction (there 
being nothing discoverable, as there was nothing foretold, 
but their excessive desolation, and that they shall not 
return), there is one striking exception to this promis- 
cuous desolation, which is alike singled out by the in- 
spired prophet and by the scientific traveller. 

Burckhardt gives a description, of no ordinary interest, 
of the site of an ancient city which he visited, the ruins 
of which, not only attest its ancient splendour, but they 
" are entitled to rank among the most curious remains 
of ancient art." Though the city be desolate, the monu- 
ments of its opulence and power are durable. These are 
— a channel on each side of the river for conveying the 
water to the city — numerous tombs — above two hundred 
and fifty sepulchres, or excavations — many mausoleums, 
one, in particular, of colossal dimensions in perfect pres- 
ervation, and a work of immense labour, containing a 
chamber sixteen paces square and above twenty-five 
feet in height, with a colonnade in front thirty-five feet 
high, crowned with a pediment highly ornamented, &c. ; 
two large truncated pyramids, and a theatre with all its 
benches, capable of containing about three thousand 
spectators, all cut out of the rock. In some places these 
sepulchres are excavated one over the other, and the side 
of the mountain is so perpendicular, that it seems impos- 
sible to approach the uppermost, no path whatever being 
visible. "The ground is covered with heaps of hewn 
stones, foundations of buildings, fragments of columns, 
and vestiges of paved streets, all clearly indicating that 
a large city once existed here. On the left bank of the 
river is a rising ground, extending westward for nearly 
three-quarters of a mile, entirely covered with similar 
remains. On the right bank, where the ground is more 
elevated, ruins of the same description are to be seen. — 
There are also the remains of a palace and of several 
temples. In the eastern cliff there are upwards of fiftv 

Zoara, Thoana, Necta, Phenon, Suzuma, Carcaria, Oboda, Berzumma, Lysa, 
Gypsaria, Zodocata, Gerasa, Havara, Presidium ad Dianam, CfcJlana, Asiun 
Gaber. 
* Burckhardt's Travels, p. 443, 444. 



IDUMEA. 151 

separate sepulcnres close to each other."* These are 
not the symbols of a feeble race, nor of a people that 
were to perish utterly. But a judgment was denounced 
against the strongholds of Edom. The prophetic threat- 
ening has not proved an empty boast, and it could not 
have been the word of an uninspired mortal. / will make 
thee small among the heathen ; thy terribleness hath deceived 
thee and the pride of thine heart, thou that dwellest in the 
clefts of the rock, that holdest the height of the hill ; though 
thou shouldst make thy nest as high as the eagle, I will 
bring thee down from thence, saith the Lord : also Edom 
shall be a desolation. 

These descriptions, given by the prophet and by the 
observer, are so analogous, and the precise locality of the 
scene, from its peculiar and characteristic features, so 
identified — and yet the application of the prophecy to the 
fact so remote from the thoughts or view of Burckhardt 
as to be altogether overlooked — that his single delinea- 
tion of the ruins of the chief (and assuredly the strongest 
and best-fortified) city of Edom was deemed in the first 
edition of this treatise, and in the terms of the preceding 
paragraph, an illustration of the prophecy alike adequate 
and legitimate. And though deprecating any allusion 
whatever of a personal nature, and earnest only for the 
elucidation of the truth, the author yet trusts that he 
may here be permitted to disclaim the credit of having 
been the first to assign to the prediction its wonderful 
and appropriate fulfilment ; and it is with no slight grati- 
fication that he is now enabled to adduce higher evidence 
than any opinion of his own, and to state, that the self- 
same prophecy has been applied by others — with the 
Bible in their hands, and with the very scene before them 
— to the selfsame spot. Yet it may be added, that this 
coincident application of the prophecy, without any col- 
lusion, and without the possibility at the time of any in- 
terchange of sentiment, affords, at least, a strong pre- 
sumptive evidence of the accuracy of the application, 
and of the truth of the prophecy ; and it may well lead 
to some reflection in the mind of any reader, if skep 
ticism has not barred every avenue against conviction. 

On entering the pass which conducts to the theatre of 
Petra, Captains Irby and Mangles remark : — " The ruin 
of tne city here burst on the view, in their full grandeur 

* Burckhardt's Tr^rels in Syria, p. 422-432 



152 IDUMEA. 

shut in on the opposite side by barren craggy preci- 
pices, from which numerous ravines and valleys branch 
out in all directions ; the sides of the mountains covered 
with an endless variety of excavated tombs and private 
dwellings (O thou that dwellest m the clefts of the rock, 
Sic. — Jer. xlix. 16) presented altogether the most singu- 
lar scene we ever beheld." 

In still further confirmation of the identity of the site, 
and the accuracy of the application, it may be added, in 
the words of Dr. Vincent, that " the name of this capital, 
in all the various languages in which it occurs, implies 
a rock, and as such it is described in the Scriptures, in 
Strabo, and Al Edrissi."* And in a note he enumerates 
among the various names having all the same significa- 
tion — Sela, a rock (the very word here used in the ori- 
ginal), Petra, a rock, the Greek name, and The Rock, 
pre-eminently — expressly referring to this passage of 
Scripture.f 

Captains Irby and Mangles, having, together with Mr. 
Bankes and Mr. Legh, spent two days in diligently ex- 
amining them, give a more particular detail of the ruins 
of Petra than Burckhardt's account supplied; and the more 
full the description, the more precise and wonderful does 
the prophecy appear. Near the spot where they awaited 
the decision of the Arabs, " the high land was covered 
upon both its sides, and on its summits, with lines and 
solid masses of dry wall. The former appeared to be 
traces of ancient cultivation, the solid ruins seemed to 
be only the remains of towers for watching in harvest 
and vintage time. The whole neighbourhood of the 
spot bears similar traces of former industry, all which 
seem to indicate the vicinity of a great metropolis." J 
A narrow and circuitous defile, surrounded on each side 
by precipitous or perpendicular rocks, varying from four 
hundred to seven hundred feet in altitude, and forming, for 
two miles, " a sort of subterranean passage," opens on the 
east the way to the ruins of Petra. The rocks, or rather 
hills, then diverge on either side, and leave an oblong 
space, where once stood the metropolis of Edom, deceived 
by its terribleness, where now lies a waste of ruins, encir- 
cled on every side, save on the north-east alone, by stu- 
pendous cliffs, which still show how the pride and labour 
of art tried there to vie with the sublimity of nature. 

* Commerce of the Ancients, vol. ii. p. 264. f See Blaney, in loco. 

% Captains Irby and Mangles's Travels, }- 402. 



IDUMEAV 153 

Along the borders of these cliffs, detached masses of 
rock, numerous and lofty, have been wrought into sepul- 
chres, the interior of which is excavated into chambers, 
while the exterior has been cut from the live rock into 
the forms of towers, with pilasters, and successive bands 
of frieze and entablature, wings, recesses, figures of ani- 
mals, and columns.* 

Yet, numerous as these are, they form but a part of 
w the vast necropolis of Petra." " Tombs present them- 
selves, not only in every avenue to the city, and upon 
every precipice that surrounds it, but even intermixed 
almost promiscuously with its public and domestic edi- 
fices ; the natural features of the defile grew more and 
more imposing at every step, and the excavations and 
sculpture more frequent on both sides, till it presented at 
last a continued street of tombs." The base of the cliffs 
wrought out in all the symmetry and regularity of art, 
with colonnades, and pedestals, and ranges of corridors 
adhering to the perpendicular surface ; flights of steps 
chiselled out of the rock; grottoes in great numbers, 
" which are certainly not sepulchral;" some excavated 
residences of large dimensions (in one of which is a 
single chamber sixty feet in length, and of a breadth 
proportioned) ; many other dwellings of inferior note, 
particularly abundant in one defile leading to the city, the 
steep sides of which contain a sort of excavated suburb, 
accessible by flights of steps ; niches, sometimes thirty 
feet in excavated height, with altars for votive offerings, 
or with pyramids, columns, or obelisks ; a bridge across 
a chasm now apparently inaccessible ; some small pyra- 
mids hewn out of the rock on the summit of the heights ; 
horizontal grooves, for the conveyance of water, cut in 
the face of the rock, and even across the architectural 
fronts of some of the excavations ; and, in short, " the 
rocks hollowed out into innumerable chambers of differ- 
ent dimensions, whose entrances are variously, richly, 
and often fantastically decorated with every imaginable 
order of architecture"! — all united, not only form one 
of the most singular scenes that the eye of man ever 
looked upon, or the imagination painted — a group of 
wonders perhaps unparalleled in their kind — but also give 
indubitable proof, both that in the land of Edom there 



* Captains Iiby ami Mangles's Travels, p. 407. 

t Ibid, p 407-437. Macmichael's Journey, p. 223, 229. 

G3 



154 

was a city where human ingenuity, and energy, and 

power must have been exerted for many ages, and to so 
great a degree as to have well entitled it to be noted for 

trength or tcrriKeness. and that the description given 
of it by the prophets oi Israel was as strictly liter 
the prediction respecting it is true. u The barren 
of the country, together with the desolate condition of 
the city, without a single human being living near it, 
seem," in the words of those who were spectators of 
the scene, " strongly to verify the judgment denounced 
against ii.""* O thou who dweilcst in the c. 
&C. — 9m shall be a desolation, &c. 

Of all the ruins oi Petra, the mausoleums and sepul- 
chres are among the most remarkable, and they give the 
clearest indication of ancient and long-continued roy- 
ally, and of courtly grandeur. Their immense number 
corroborates the accounts given of their successive kings 
and princes by Moses and Strabo ; though a period oi 
eighteen hundred years intervened between the dates of 
their respective records concerning them. The structure 
of the sepulchres also shows that many of them are of 
a more recent date. M Great," says Burekkardt, " must 
have been the opulence of a city which could dedicate 
such monuments to the memory of its rulers."! But the 
long line of the kings and of the nobles of Idumea has 
for ages been cut off; they are without any representa- 
tive now, without any memorial but the multitude and 
the magnificence oi their unvisited sepulchres. 
shall call the nobles thereof to the kingdom (or rather, they 
shall call, or summon, the nobles thereof) but there shall 
be no kingdom there, and all her princes shall be nothing. 

Amid the mausoleums and sepulchres, the remains 
of temples or palaces, and the multiplicity oi tombs, 
which all form, as it were, the grave oi Idumea, where 
its ancient splendour is interred, there are edirices, the 
Roman and Grecian architecture of which decides that 
they were built long posterior to the era of the prophets.J 
Theu shall build, but I will throw dt 

J*hey shall be called the border 
contrasts the quiet disposition of the citizens oi Petra 
with the contentious spirit of the foreigners who resided 
there ; and the uninterrupted tranquillity which the towns- 

* Irby and Mangies's 7 ravels & 439. | Burckhardt's Travels, p, 425 . 

lata 



IDTJMEA. 1 5* 

men mutually maintained together, excited the admira- 
tion of Athenodorus.* The fine gold is changed: no such 
people are there now to be found. Though Burckhardt 
travelled as an Arab, associated with them, submitted to 
all their privations, and was so completely master of 
their language and of their manners as to escape de- 
tection, he was yet reduced to that state, within the 
boundaries of Edom, which can alone secure tranquillity 
to the traveller in the desert ; " he had nothing with him 
that could attract the notice or excite the cupidity of the 
Bedouins, and was even stripped of some rags that cov- 
ered his wounded ankles." The Arabs in that quarter, 
he observes, "have the reputation of being very daring 
thieves." In like manner, a motselim, who had been 
twenty years in office, pledged himself to Captains Irby 
and Mangles, and the travellers who accompanied them 
(in presence of the Governor of Jerusalem), that the 
Arabs of Wady Mousa are " a most savage and treach- 
erous race," and added, that they would make use of 
their Frank blood for a medicine. That this character 
of wickedness and cruelty was not misapplied they had 
too ample proof, not only in the dangers with which they 
were threatened, but by the fact which they learned on 
the spot, that upwards of thirty pilgrims from Barbary 
had been murdered at Petra the preceding year, by the 
men of Wady Mousa.f Even the Arabs of the surround- 
ing deserts, as already stated, dread to approach it ; and 
towards the borders of Edom on the south, " the Arabs 
about Akaba," as described by Pococke, and as experi- 
enced by Burckhardt, " are a very bad people, and noto- 
rious robbers, and are at war with all others. "t Such 
evidence, all undesignedly given, clearly shows that in 
truth Edom is called the border of wickedness. 

Thorns shall come in her palaces, nettles and brambles in 
the fortresses thereof In lieu of any direct and explicit 
statement in corroboration of the literal fulfilment of this 
prediction, it may be worthy of observation, that the 
camels of the Bedouins feed upon the thorny branches 
of the talh (gum arabic) tree, of which they are ex- 
tremely fond ; that the large thorns of these trees are a 
great annoyance to them and to their cattle : and that 
they are so abundant in different parts of Idumea, that 

* Strabo, p. 779. 

f Irby and Mangles's Travels, p. 417. Macmichael's Journey, p. 202, 234. 

i Pococke's Description of the East, vol. i. p. 136. 



156 IDUMEA. 

each Bedouin carries in his girdle a pair of small pincers 
to extract the thorns from his feet.* 

I will make thee small among the nations ; thou art greatly 
despised. Though the border of wickedness, and the re- 
treat of a horde of thieves, who are distinguished as pe 
culiarly savage even among the wild Arabs, and thus an 
object of dread, as well as of astonishment, to those who 
pass thereby, yet, contrasted with what it was, or reck- 
oned among the nations, Edom is small indeed. Within 
almost all its boundary, it may be said that none abide, 
or have any fixed or permanent residence ; and instead 
of the superb structures, the works of various ages, 
which long adorned its cities, the huts of the Arabs, 
where even huts they have, are mere mud-hovels of 
" mean and ragged appearance," which, in general, are 
deserted on the least alarm. But, miserable habitations 
as these are, they scarcely seem to exist anywhere 
throughout Edom, but on a single point on its borders ; 
and wherever the Arabs otherwise wander in search of 
spots for pasturage for their cattle (found in hollows, or 
near to springs after the winter rains), tents are their 
only covering. Those which pertain to the more pow- 
erful tribes are sometimes both numerous and large : 
yet, though they form at least but a frail dwelling, many 
of them are " very low and small." Near to the ruins 
of Petra, Burckhardt passed an encampment of Bedouin 
tents, most of which were " the smallest he had* ever 
seen, about four feet high, and ten in length;" and 
towards the south-west border of Edom he met with a 
few wanderers who had no tents with them, and whose 
only shelter from the burning rays of the sun and the 
heavy dews of night was the scanty branches of the talh- 
trees. The subsistence of the Bedouins is often as pre- 
carious as their habitations are mean; the flocks they 
tend, or which they pillage from more fertile regions, 
are their only possessions ; and in that land where com- 
merce long concentrated its wealth, and through which 
the treasures of Ophir passed, the picking of gum arabic 
from thorny branches is now the poor occupation, the 
only semblance of industry, practised by the wild and 
wandering tenants of a desert. Edom is small among the 
nations ; and how greatly is it despised, when the public 
authorities at Constantinople deny any knowledge of it, 

* Bnrckhardrs Travels in Syria, p. 441, 442, 446. 



IDUMEA. 157 

or of the ruins of its capital, which once defied the pow- 
ers of Rome — when the city of Petra is thus forgotten 
and unknown among the representatives of the villagers 
of Byzantium! 

Concerning Edom, thus saith the Lord, Is ivisdom no 
more in Teman? Is understanding perished from the 
prudent ? Shall I not destroy the wise men out of JEdom, 
and understanding out of the Mount of Esau? Fallen 
and despised as now it is, Edom, did not the prescription 
of many ages abrogate its right, might lay claim to the 
title of having been the first seat of learning, as well as 
the centre of commerce. Sir Isaac Newton, who was 
no mean master in chronology, and no incompetent judge 
to give a decision in regard to the rise and first progress 
of literature, considers Edom as the nursery of the arts 
and sciences, and adduces evidence to that effect from 
profane as well as from sacred history. " The Egyp- 
tians," he remarks, " having learned the skill of the Edom- 
ites, began now to observe the position of the stars, and 
the length of the solar year, for enabling them to know 
the position of the stars at any time, and to sail by them 
at all times without sight of the shore, and this gave a 
beginning to astronomy and navigation."* "It seems 
that letters, and astronomy, and the trade of carpenters 
were invented by the merchants of the Red Sea, and 
that they were propagated from Arabia Petraea into 
Egypt, Chaldea, Syria, Asia Minor, and Europe."! While 
the philosopher may thus think of Edom with respect, 
neither the admirer of genius, the man of feeling, nor 
the child of devotion will, even to this day, seek from 
any land a richer treasure of plaintive poetry, of impas- 
sioned eloquence, and of fervid piety, than Edom has 
bequeathed to the world in the book of Job. It exhibits 
to us, in language the most pathetic and sublime, all that 
a man could feel, in the outward pangs of his body and 
the inner writhings of his mind, of the frailties of his 
frame, and of the dissolution of his earthly comforts 
and endearments ; all that mortal can discern, by medi- 
tating on the ways and contemplating the works of 
God, of the omniscience and omnipotence of the Most 
High, and of the inscrutable dispensations of his provi- 
dence ; all that knowledge which could first tell, in 

* Sir Isaac Newton's Chronology of Ancient Kingdoms, p. 208. 
t Ibid- p. 212. 

14 



158 IDUMEA. 

written word, of Arcturus, and Orion, and the Pleiades ; 
and all that devotedness of soul, and immortality of hope, 
which, with patience that faltered not even when the 
heart was bruised and almost broken, and the body- 
covered over with distress, could say, " Though he slay 
me, yet will I trust in him." 

But if the question now be asked. Is understanding 
perished out of Edom ] the answer, like every response 
of the prophetic word, may be briefly given : It is. The 
minds of the Bedouins are as uncultivated as the deserts 
they traverse. Practical wisdom is, in general, the first 
that man learns, and the last that he retains. And the 
simple but significant fact, already alluded to, that the 
clearing away of a little rubbish, merely " to allow the 
water to flow 5 ' into an ancient cistern, in order to render 
it useful to themselves, " is an undertaking far beyond 
the views of the wandering Arabs," shows that under- 
standing is indeed perished from among them* They view 
the indestructible works of former ages, not only with 
wonder, but with superstitious regard, and consider them 
as the work of genii. They look upon a European trav 
eller as a magician, and believe that, having seen any 
spot where they imagine that treasures are deposited, 
" he can afterward command the guardian of the treasure 
to set the whole before him."* In Teman, which yet 
maintains a precarious existence, the inhabitants possess 
the desire without the means of knowledge. The Koran 
is their only study, and contains the sum of their wis- 
dom. And, although he was but a " miserable com- 
forter," and was overmastered in argument by a kinsman 
stricken with affliction, yet no Temanite can now discourse 
with either the wisdom or the pathos of Eliphaz of old. 
Wisdom is no more in Teman, and understanding has 
perished out of the Mount of Esau. 

While there is thus subsisting evidence and proof 
that the ancient inhabitants of Edom were renowned for 
wisdom as well as for power, and while desolation has 
spread so widely over it, that it can scarcely be said to 
be inhabited by man, there still are tenants who hold 
possession of it, to whom it was abandoned by man, and 
to whom it was decreed by a voice more than mortal. 
And insignificant and minute as it may possibly appear 
to those who reject the light of revelation, or to the un- 

* Burckharars Travels, p. 429. 



IDUMEA. 159 

reflecting mind (that will use no measuring-line of truth 
which stretches beyond that which inches out its own 
shallow thoughts, and wherewith, rejecting all other aid, 
it tries, by the superficial touch of ridicule alone, to sound 
the unfathomable depths of infinite Wisdom), yet the fol- 
lowing scripture, mingled with other words already veri- 
fied as the voice of inspiration, and voluntarily involving 
its title to credibility in the appended appeal to fact and 
challenge to investigation, may, in conjunction with kin- 
dred proofs, yet tell to man — if hearing he will hear, and 
show him, if seeing he will see — the verity of the divine 
word, and the infallibility of the divine judgments ; and, 
not without the aid of the rightful and unbiassed exercise 
of reason, may give under standing to the skeptic, that 
he may be converted, and that he may be healed by Him 
whose word is ever truth. 

" But the cormorant and the bittern shall possess it 
(Idumea) ; the owl also, and the raven shall dwell in it. 
It shall be a habitation for dragons and a court for owls : 
the wild beasts of the desert shall also meet with the 
wild beasts of the island, and the satyr (the hairy or 
rough creature) shall cry to his fellow ; the screech owl 
also shall rest there, and find for herself a place of rest ; 
there shall the great owl make her nest, and lay, and 
hatch, and gather under her shadow ; there shall the vul- 
tures also be gathered every one with her mate. Seek 
ye out of the book of the Lord and read ; no one of 
these shall fail, none shall want her mate ; for my mouth 
it hath commanded, and his spirit it hath gathered them. 
And he hath cast the lot for them, and his hand hath 
divided it unto them by line : they shall possess it for 
ever; from generation to generation shall they dwell 
therein."* "I laid the mountains of Esau and his herit- 
age waste for the dragons of the wilderness."! 

Such is the precision of the prophecies, so remote are 
they from all ambiguity of meaning, and so distinct are 
the events which they detail, that it is almost unneces- 
sary to remark, that the different animals here enume- 
rated were not all in the same manner, or in the same 
degree, to be possessors of Edom. Some of them were 
to rest, to meet, to be gathered there : the owl and the 
raven were to dwell in it, and it was to be a habitation 
for dragons ; while of the cormorant and bittern, it is 

* Isa. xxxiv. 11 13-17. t Mai. i. 3. 



160 IBUMEA. 

emphatically said, that they were to possess it. And is 
it not somewhat beyond a mere fortuitous coincidence, 
imperfect as the information is respecting Edom, that, 
in " seeking out" proof concerning these animals and 
whether none of them do fail, the most decisive evidence 
should, in the first instance, be unconsciously communi- 
cated from the boundaries of Edom, of the one which 
is first noted in the prediction, and which, was to possess 
the land 1 It will at once be conceded, that in whatever 
country any particular animal is unknown, no proper 
translation of its name can there be given ; and that for 
the purpose of designating or identifying it, reference 
must be had to the original name, and to the natural his- 
tory of the country in which it is known. And, without 
any ambiguity or perplexity arising from the translation 
of the word, or any need of tracing it through any other 
languages to ascertain its import, the identical word of 
the original, with scarcely the slightest variation (and 
that only the want of the final vowel in the Hebrew 
word ; vowels in that language being often supplied in 
the enunciation, or by points), is, from the affinity of the 
Hebrew and Arabic, used on the very spot by the Arabs, 
to denote the very bird which may literally be said to 
possess the land. While in the last inhabited village of 
Moab, and close upon the borders of Edom, Burckhardt 
noted the animals which frequented the neighbouring 
territory, in which he distinctly specifies Shera, the land 
of the Edomites ; and he relates that the bird katta* is 
" met with in immense numbers. They fly in such large 
flocks that the Arab boys often kill two or three of them 
at a time, merely by throwing a stick among them." If 
any objector be here inclined to say, that it is not to be 
wondered at that any particular bird should be found in 
any given country, that it might continue to remain for a 
term of ages, and that such a surmise would not exceed 
the natural probabilities of the case, the fact may be 
freely admitted as applicable, perhaps, to most countries 
of the globe. But whoever, elsewhere, saw any wild 
bird in any country, in flocks so immensely numerous, 
that two or three of them could be killed by the single 
throw of a stick from the hand of a boy ; and that thi? 
could be stated, not as a forcible, and perhaps false, illus- 

* flXp kat, a species of partridge. It is sometimes written, in the original 
fcata. Onkel KHp, vide Simonis Lexicon, p. 1393. 



IDUMEA. 161 

tration to denote their number, nor as a wonderful chance 
or unusual incident, but as a fact of frequent occurrence % 
Whoever, elsewhere, heard of such a fact, not as happen- 
ing merely on a sea rock, the resort of myriads of birds, 
or their temporary resting-place, when exhausted in their 
flight, but in an extensive country, their permanent 
abode 1 Or if, among the manifold discoveries of travel- 
lers in modern times, it were really related that such 
occupants of a country are to be found, or that a corres- 
ponding fact exists in any other region of the earth 
which was once tenanted by man, who can also " find" 
in the records of a high antiquity the prediction that 
declared it ] Of what country now inhabited could the 
same fact be now with certainty foretold ; and where is 
the seer who can discern the vision, fix on the spot over 
the world's surface, and select, from the whole winged 
tribe, the name of the first in order and the greatest in 
number of the future and chief possessors of the land ] 

Of the bittern (kephud) as a joint possessor with the 
katta of Idumea, evidence has not been given, or ascer- 
tained; — but numerous as the facts have been which 
modern discoveries have consigned over to the service 
of revelation, that word of truth which fears no investi- 
gation can appeal to other facts, unknown to history and 
still undiscovered — but registered in prophecy, and there 
long since revealed. 

The owl oho and the raven {or crow) shall dwell in it.—- 
The owl and raven do dwell in it. Captain Mangles re- 
lates, that while he and his fellow-travellers were exam- 
ining the ruins and contemplating the sublime scenery of 
Petra, " the screaming of the eagles, hawks, and owls, 
who were soaring above their heads in considerable 
numbers, seemingly annoyed at any one approaching 
their lonely habitation, added much to the singularity of 
the scene.'' " The fields of Tafyle," situated in the im- 
mediate vicinity of Edom, are, according to the observa- 
tion of Burckhardt, " frequented by an immense number 
of crows." "I expected," says Seetzen (alluding to 
his purposed tour through Idumea, and to the informa- 
tion he had received from the Arabs), "to make several 
discoveries in mineralogy, as well as in the animals 
and vegetables of the country, on the manna of the 
desert, the ravens,"* &c. 

* Seetzen's Travels, p. 46 

14* 



162 IDUMEA. 

It shall be a habitation for dragcns {serpents), I laid 
his heritage waste for the foagons of the wilderness, — The 
evidence, though derived from testimony, and not from 
personal observation, of two travellers of so contrary 
characters and views as Shaw and Volney, is so accord- 
ant and apposite, that it may well be sustained in lieu of 
more direct proof. The former represents the land of 
Edom, and the wilderness of which it now forms part, as 
abounding with a variety of lizards and vipers, which are 
very dangerous and troublesome.* And the narrative 
given by Volney, already quoted, is equally decisive as to 
the fact. The Arabs, in general, avoid the ruins of the 
cities of Idumea, " on account of the enormous scorpions 
with which they swarm" Its cities, thus deserted by man, 
and abandoned to their undisturbed and hereditary posses- 
sion, Edom may justly be called the inheritance of dragons. 

The wild beasts of the desert shall also meet with the wild 
beasts of the island, (or of the borders of the sea). Instead 
of these words of the English version, Parkhurst renders 
the former the ravenous birds hunting the icilderness. 
This interpretation was given long before the fact to 
which it refers was made known. But it has now been 
ascertained (and without any allusion, on the other hand, 
to the prediction) that eagles,f hawks, and ravens, all 
ravenous birds, are common in Edom, and do not fail to 
illustrate the prediction as thus translated. But when 
animals from different regions are said to meet, the 
prophecy, thus implying that some of them at least did 
not properly pertain to the country, would seem to re- 
quire some further verification. And of all the wonder- 
ful circumstances attached to the history, or pertaining 
to the fate, of Edom, there is one which is not to be ranked 
among the least in singularity, that bears no remote ap- 
plication to the prefixed prophecy, and that ought not, 
perhaps, to pass here unnoted. It is recorded in an an- 
cient chronicle, that the Emperor Decius caused fierce 
lions and lionesses to be transported from (the deserts 
of) Africa to the borders of Palestine and Arabia, in 
order that, propagating there, they might act as an an- 
noyance and a barrier to the barbarous Saracens :{ De ~ 

* Shaw's Travels, vol. ii. p. 105, 338. f Burckhardt's Travels, p. 405. 

X f dvrog Aeicios (SaciXevg Tjyayev dito Trjg A<ppiK?jg Xeovrdg (poBepug kcu, 
"Xsalvag Kai aneXvaiv eig to Xi/xl-ov avdroXrjg axo Apa(3iag tcai IlaXaijxTivijs 
&t>j r" KipKiam Kao-py npog to iroitjcai yeveav 6ia Tug fiapafiapsg 'ZapaKrjvuS' — 
Chronicon Alexandrinum, ad ann. C. 353. Relandi Palestina,p. 97. 



iDUMEA. 163 

tween Arabia and Palestine lies the doomed and execrated 
land of Edom. And may it not thus be added, that a 
cause so unnatural and unforeseen would greatly tend 
to the destruction of the flocks, and to the desolation of 
all the adjoining territory, — and seem to be as if the king 
of the forest was to take possession of it for his sub- 
jects ] And may it not be even literally said that the 
wild beasts of the desert meet there ivith the wild beasts of 
the borders of the sea ? 

The satyr shall dwell there. — The satyr is entirely a 
fabulous animal. The word (soir) literally means a 
rough, hairy one ; and, like a synoymous word in both the 
Greek and Latin languages which has the same signifi- 
cation, has been translated both by lexicographers and 
commentators the goat.* Parkhurst says, that in this 
sense he would understand this very passage ; and Lowth 
distinctly asserts, without assigning to it any other 
meaning, that "the word originally signifies goat"\ 
Such respectable and well-known authorities have been 
cited, because their decision must have rested on criti- 
cism alone, as it was impossible that their minds could 
have been biassed by any knowledge of the fact in refer- 
ence to Edom. It was their province, and that of others, 
to illustrate its meaning — it was Burckhardt's, however 
unconsciously, to bear, from ocular observation, witness 
to its truth. "In all the Wadys south of the Modjel 
and El Asha" (pointing to Edom), "large herds of moun- 
tain goats are met with. They pasture in flocks of 
forty and fifty together.'^ — They dwell there. 

But the evidence respecting all the animals specified 
in the prophecy, as the future possessors of Edom, is 
not yet complete, and is difficult to be ascertained. And, 
in words that seem to indicate this very difficulty, it is 
still reserved for future travellers, — perhaps some uncon- 
scious Volney, — to disclose the facts; and for future 
inquirers, whether Christian or infidel, to seek out of 
the book of the Lord and read : and to " find that no one 
of these do fail." Yet, recent as the disclosure of any 

* "So the Greek rpayog, a he-goat, is from rpaicvs, rough, on account of tho 
rovghness of his hair; and the Latin hircus, a he-goat, from hirtus, rough." — 
Parkhurst's Lexicon. 

t Lowth assigns the reason why the word is translated satyr, — it was sup- 
posed that evil spirits of old time appeared in the shape of goats, as the learned 
Bochart hath proved. Isaiah xiii. 21. 

X Burckhardt's Trav *ls in Syria. 



164 IDUMEA. 

information respecting them has been, and offered, as 
it now for the first time is, for the consideration of every 
candid mind, the positive terms and singleness of object 
of the prophecies themselves, and the undesigned and 
decisive evidence are surely enough to show how greatly 
these several specific predictions and their respective 
facts exceed all possibility of their being the word or 
the work of man ; and how clearly there may be dis- 
covered in them all, if sight itself be conviction, the cre- 
dentials of inspiration, and the operation of His hands, 
— to whose prescience futurity is open, — to whose power 
all nature is subservient, — and " whose mouth it hath 
commanded, and whose spirit it hath gathered them." 

Noted as Edom was for its terribleness, and possessed 
of a capital city, from which even a feeble people could 
not easily have been dislodged, there scarcely could have 
been a question, even among its enemies, to what people 
that country would eventually belong. And it never 
could have been thought of by any native of another 
land, as the Jewish prophets were, nor by any uninspired 
mortal whatever, that a kingdom which had previously 
subsisted so long (and in which princes ceased not to 
reign, commerce to flourish, and " a people of great opu- 
lence" to dwell for more than six hundred years there- 
after) would be finally extinct, that all its cities would 
be for ever desolate, and though it could have boasted 
more than any other land of indestructible habitations 
for men, that their habitations would be desolate ; and that 
certain ivild animals, mentioned by name, would in differ- 
ent manners and degrees possess the country from gene- 
ration to generation. 

There shall not be any remaining of the house of Esau, 
Edom shall be cut off for ever. The aliens of Judah ever 
look with wistful eyes to the land of their fathers ; but 
no Edomite is now to be found to dispute the right of 
any animal to the possession of it, or to banish the owl 
from the temples and palaces of Edom. But the house 
of Esau did remain, and existed in great power, till after 
the commencement of the Christian era, a period far too 
remote from the date of the prediction for their subse- 
quent history to have been foreseen by man. The Idu- 
means were soon after mingled with the Nabatheans. 
And in the third century their language was disused, and 
their very name, as designating any people, had utterly 



IDUMEA- 165 

perished ;* and their country itself, having become an 
outcast from Syria, among whose kingdoms it had long 
been numbered, was united to Arabia Petraea. Though 
the descendants of the twin-born Esau and Jacob have 
met a diametrically opposite fate, the fact is no less 
marvellous and undisputed, than the prediction in each 
case is alike obvious and true. While the posterity of 
Jacob have been " dispersed in every country under 
heaven," and are " scattered among all nations," and 
have ever remained distinct from them all, and while it 
is also declared that " a full end will never be made of 
them," the Edomites, though they existed as a nation 
for more than seventeen hundred years, have, as a period 
of nearly equal duration has proved, been cut off for 
ever; and while Jews are in every land, there is not 
any remaining on any spot of earth of the house of Esau. 
Idumea, in aid of a neighbouring state, did send forth, 
on a sudden, an army of twenty thousand armed men, — 
it contained at least eighteen towns, for centuries after 
the Christian era, — successive kings and princes reigned 
in Petra, — and magnificent palaces and temples, whose 
empty chambers and naked walls of wonderful architec- 
ture still strike the traveller with amazement, were con- 
structed there, at a period unquestionably far remote 
from the time when it was given to the prophets of Israel 
to tell, that the house of Esau was to be cut off for ever, 
that there would be no kingdom there, and that wild ani- 
mals would possess Edom for a heritage. And so de- 
spised is Edom, and the memory of its greatness lost, 
that there is no record of antiquity that can so clearly 
show us what once it was in the days of its power, as 
we can now read in the page of prophecy its existing 
desolation. But in that place where kings kept their 
court, and where nobles assembled, where manifest 
proofs of ancient opulence are concentrated, where 
princely habitations, retaining their external grandeur, 
but bereft of all their splendour, still look as if " fresh 
from the chisel," — even there no man dwells, it is given 
by lot to birds, and beasts, and reptiles ; it is a " court 
for owls," and scarcely are they ever frayed from their 
" lonely habitation" by the tread of a solitary traveller 
from a far distant land, among deserted dwellings and 
desolated ruins. 

* Origen, lib. iii. in Job. 



165 IDUMEA. 

Hidden as the history and state of Edom has been for 
ages, every recent disclosure, being an echo of the pro- 
phecies, amply corroborates the truth, that the word of 
the Lord does not return unto him void, but ever fulfils 
the purpose for which he hath sent it. But the whole 
of its work is not yet wrought in Edom, which has fur- 
ther testimony in store : and while the evidence is not 
yet complete, so neither is the time of the final judg- 
ments on the land yet fully come. Judea, Amnion, and 
Moab, according to the word of prophecy, shall revive 
from their desolation, and the wild animals who have 
conjoined their depredations with those of barbarous 
men, in perpetuating the desolation of these countries, 
shall find a refuge and undisturbed possession in Edom, 
when, the year of recompenses for the controversy of 
Zion being past, it shall be divided unto them by line, 
when they shall possess it for ever, and from generation 
to generation shall dwell therein. But without looking 
into futurity, a retrospect may here warrant, before leav- 
ing the subject, a concluding clause. 

That man is a bold believer, and must with whatever 
reluctance forego the name of skeptic, who possesses 
such redundant credulity as to think that all the predic- 
tions respecting Edom, and all others recorded in Scrip- 
ture, and realized by facts, were the mere haphazard 
results of fortuitous conjectures. And he who thus, with- 
out reflecting how incongruous it is to " strain at a 
gnat and swallow a camel," can deliberately, and with 
an unruffled mind, place such an opinion among the 
articles of his faith, may indeed be pitied by those who 
know in whom they have believed, but, if he forfeit not 
thereby all right of ever appealing to reason, must at 
least renounce all title to stigmatize, in others, even the 
most preposterous belief. Or if such, after all, must 
needs be his philosophical creed, and his rational con- 
viction! what can hinder him from believing also that 
other chance words — such as truly marked the fate of 
Edom, but more numerous and clear, and which, were 
he to " seek out and read," he would find in the self- 
same " book of the Lord" — may also prove equally true 
to the spirit, if not to the letter, against all the enemies 
of the gospel, whether hypocrites or unbelievers 1 May 
not his belief in the latter instance be strengthened by 
the experience that many averments of Scripture, in 
respect to times then future, and to facts then unknown, 



IEUMEA. 165 

have already proved true 1 And may he not here find 
some analogy, at least, on which to rest his faith, 
whereas the conviction which, in the former case, he so 
readily cherishes is totally destitute of any semblance 
whatever to warrant the possibility of its truth 1 Or is 
this indeed the sum of his boasted wisdom, to hold to 
the conviction of the fallacy of all the coming judgments 
denounced in Scripture till " experience," personal though 
it should be, prove them to be as true as the past, and a 
compulsory and unchangeable but unredeeming faith be 
grafted on despair ] Or if less proof can possibly suffice, 
let him timely read and examine, and disprove also, all 
the credentials of revelation, before he account the be- 
liever credulous, or the unbeliever wise ; or else let him 
abandon the thought that the unrepentant iniquity and 
wilful perversity of man and an evil heart of unbelief 
(all proof derided, all offered mercy rejected, all meet- 
ness for an inheritance among them that are sanctified 
unattained, and all warning lost) shall not finally forbid 
that Edom stand alone — the seared and blasted monu- 
ment of the judgments of Heaven. 

A word may here be spoken even to the wise. Were 
any of the sons of men to be uninstructed in the fear of 
the Lord, which is the beginning of wisdom, and in the 
knowledge of his word, which maketh wise unto salva- 
tion, and to be thus ignorant of the truths and precepts 
of the gospel, which should all tell upon every deed 
done in the body ; what in such a case — if all their supe- 
rior knowledge were unaccompanied by religious prin- 
ciples — would all mechanical and physical science event- 
ually prove but the same, in kind, as the wisdom of the 
wise men of Edom ? And were they to perfect in astron- 
omy, navigation, and mechanics what, according to Sir 
Isaac Newton, the Edomites began, what would the 
moulding of matter to their will avail them, as moral 
and accountable beings, if their own hearts were not con- 
formed to the Divine will; and what would all their 
labour be at last but strength spent for naught 1 For 
were they to raise column above column, and again to 
hew a city out of the cliffs of the rock, let but such 
another word of that God whom they seek not to know 
go forth against it, and all their mechanical ingenuity 
and labour would just end in forming — that which Petra 
is, and which Rome itself is destined to be — " a cage of 
every unclean and hateful bird." The experiment has 



168 PHILISTIA. 

already been made ; it may well and wisely be trusted to, 
as much as those which mortals make; and it is set 
before us that, instead of provoking the Lord to far worse 
than its repetition in personal judgments against our- 
selves, we may be warned by the spirit of prophecy, 
which is the testimony of Jesus, to hear and obey the 
words of Him — " even of Jesus, who delivereth from the 
wrath to come." For how much greater than any deg- 
radation to which hewn but unfeeling rocks can be re- 
duced, is that of a soul, which while in the body might 
have been formed anew after the image of an all holy 
God, and made meet for beholding His face in glory, 
passing from spiritual darkness into a spiritual state, 
where all knowledge of earthly things shall cease to be 
power — where all the riches of this world shall cease to 
be gain — where the want of religious principles and of 
Christian virtues shall leave the soul naked, as the bare 
and empty dwellings in the clefts of the rocks — where 
the thoughts of worldly wisdom, to which it was inured 
before, shall haunt it still, and be more unworthy and 
hateful occupants of the immortal spirit than are the 
owls amid the palaces of Edom — and where all those sin- 
ful passions which rested on the things that were seen 
shall be like unto the scorpions which hold Edom as their 
heritage for ever, and which none can now scare away 
from among the wild vines that are there entwined 
around the broken altars where false gods were wor- 
shipped ! 

PHILISTIA. 

The land of the Philistines bordered on the west and 
south-west of Judea, and lies on the south-east point of 
the Mediterranean Sea. The country to the north of 
Gaza is very fertile, and long after the Christian era it 
possessed a very numerous population, and strongly for- 
tified cities. No human probability could possibly have 
existed in the time of the prophets, or at a much more 
recent date, of its eventual desolation. But it has belied, 
for many ages, every promise which the fertility of its 
soil and the excellence both of its climate and situation 
gave, for many preceding centuries, of its permanency, as 
a rich and well-cultivated region. And the voice of pro- 
phecy, which was not silent respecting it, proclaimed 
the fate that awaited it, in terms as contradictory, at t:^ 



PHILISTIA. 169 

time, to every natural suggestion, as they are descriptive 
of what Philistia now actually is. 

" I will stretch out my hand upon the Philistines, and 
destroy the remnant of the seacoasts."* " baldness is 
come upon Gaza ; Ashkelon is cut off with the remnant 
of their valley."! " Thus saith the Lord, for three trans- 
gressions of Gaza, and for four, I will not turn away 
the punishment thereof. I will send a fire upon the wall 
of Gaza which shall devour the palaces thereof. And I 
will cut off the inhabitant from Ashdod, and him that 
holdeth the sceptre from Ashkelon ; and I will turn my 
hand against Ekron ; and the remnant of the Philistines 
shall perish, saith the Lord God."± " For Ashkelon shall 
be a desolation ; it shall be cut off with the remnant of 
the valley; and Ekron shall be rooted up — Canaan, 
the land of the Philistines, I will even destroy you, that 
there shall be no inhabitant ; and the seacoast shall be 
dwellings and cottages for shepherds, and folds for 
flocks."^ " The king shall perish from Gaza, and Ash- 
kelon shall not be inhabited."|| 

The land of the Philistines ivas to be destroyed* It par- 
takes of the general desolation common to it with Judea 
and other neighbouring states. While ruins are to be 
found in all Syria, they are particularly abundant along 
the seacoast, which formed, on the south, the realm of 
the Philistines. But its aspect presents some existing 
peculiarities, which travellers fail not to particularize, 
and which, in reference both to the state of the country, 
and the fate of its different cities, the prophets failed not 
to discriminate as justly as if their description had been 
drawn both with all the accuracy which ocular observa- 
tion and all the certainty which authenticated history 
could give. And the authority so often quoted may 
here be again appealed to. Volney (though, like one who 
in ancient times was instrumental to the fulfilment of a 
special prediction, " he meant not so, neither did his heart 
think so"), from the manner in which he generalizes his 
observations, and marks the peculiar features of the dif- 
ferent districts of Syria, with greater acuteness and per- 
spicuity than any other traveller whatever, is the ever- 
ready purveyor of evidence in all the cases which came 
within the range of his topographical description ol the 

* Ezekiel xxv. 16. T Jeremiah xlvii. 5. % Amos i. 6, 7, 8. 

§ Zephaniah ii. 4, 5, 6. || Zectiariali ix. 5. 

15 H 



170 PHILISTIA. 

wide field of prophecy — while, at the same time, f om 
his known, open, and zealous hostility to the Chrisuaa 
cause, his testimony is alike decisive and unquestionable : 
and the vindication of the truth of the following predic- 
tions may safely be committed to this redoubted champion 
of infidelity. 

The seacoasts shall be dwellings and cottages for shepherds, 
and folds for flocks. The remnant of the Philistines shall 
perish. Baldness is come upon Gaza ; it shall be forsaken* 
The king shall perish from Gaza, I will cut off the inhabit- 
ants from Ashdod. Ashkelon shall be a desolation, it shall be 
cut offiuith the remnant of the valley; it shall not be iiihabited. 
" In the plain between Ramla and Gaza" (the very plain 
of the Philistines along the seacoast) " we met with a 
number of villages badly built, of dried mud, and which, 
like the inhabitants, exhibit every mark of poverty and 
wretchedness. The houses, on a nearer view, are only 
so many huts (cottages) sometimes detached, at others 
ranged in the form of cells around a courtyard, enclosed 
by a mud wall. In winter, they and their cattle may be 
said to live together, the part of the dwelling allotted to 
themselves being only raised two feet above that in which 
they lodge their beasts" — (dwellings and cottages for shep- 
herds, and folds for flocks), " Except the environs of these 
villages, all the rest of the country is a desert, and aban- 
doned to the Bedouin Arabs, who feed their flocks on it."* 
The remnant shall perish ; the land of the Philistines shall 
be destroyed, that there shall be no inhabitant, and the 
seacoasts shall be dwellings and cottages for shepherds, 
and folds for flocks. 

" The ruins of white marble sometimes found at Gaza 
prove that it was formerly the abode of luxury and opu- 
lence. It has shared in the general destruction: and, 
notwithstanding its proud title of the capital of Pales- 
tine, it is now no more than a defenceless village" (bald- 
ness has come upon it), " peopled by, at most, only two thou- 
sand inhabitants."! & * s forsaken and bereaved of its king, 
" The seacoast, by which it was formerly washed, is 
every day removing farther from the deserted ruins of 
Ashkelon."J It shall be a desolation, Ashkelon shall not be 
inhabited, "Amid the various successive ruins, those 
of Edzoud (Ashdod), so powerful under the Philistines, 

* Volney's Travels, vol. ii. p. 335, 336. 
t Ibid. 310 % Ibid. 33N. 



PHILTSTIA, ETC. 171 

are now remarkable for their scorpions." The inhabitants 
shall be cut off from Ashdod. 

Although the Christian traveller must yield the palm to 
Volney,* as the topographer of prophecy, and although 
supplementary evidence be not requisite, yet a place is 
here willingly given to the following just observations. 

" Ashkelon was one of the proudest satrapies of the 
lords of the Philistines ; now there is not an inhabitant 
within its walls : and the prophecy of Zechariah is ful- 
filled. The king shall perish from Gaza, and Ashkelon 
shall not be inhabited. When the prophecy was uttered, 
both cities were in an equally flourishing condition : and 
nothing but the prescience of Heaven could pronounce on 
which of the two, and in what manner, the vial of its 
wrath should be poured out. Gaza is truly without a 
king. The lofty towers of Ashkelon lie scattered on 
the ground, and the ruins within its walls do not shelter 
a human being. How is the wrath of man made to praise 
his Creator ! Hath he not said, and shall he not do it ? 
The oracle was delivered by the mouth of the prophet 
more than five hundred years before the Christian era, 
and we beheld its accomplishment eighteen hundred years 
after that event, "t 

Cogent and just as the reasoning is, the facts stated 
by Volney give wider scope for an irresistible argument. 
The fate of one city is not only distinguished from that 
of another ; but the varied aspect of the country itself, 
the dwellings and cottages for shepherds in one part, and 
that very region named, the rest of the land destroyed 
and uninhabited, a desert, and abandoned to the flocks 
of the wandering Arabs ; Gaza, bereaved of a king, a 
defenceless village, destitute of all its fortifications; 
Ashkelon, a desolation, and without an inhabitant ; the 
inhabitants also cut off from Ashdod, as reptiles tenanted 
it instead of men — form in each instance a specific pre- 

* Had Volney been a believer, had he " sought out of the book of the Lord 
and read," and had he applied all the facts which he knew in illustration of the 
prophecies, how completely would he have proved their inspiration ! But it is 
well for the cause of truth that such a witness was himself an unbeliever .for 
his evidence, in many an instance, comes so very close to the predictions, tliat 
his testimony, in the relation of positive facts, would have been utterly dis 
credited, and held as purposely adapted to the very words of prophecy, by those 
who otherwise lent a greedy ear to his utterance of some of the wildest fan- 
cies and most gross untruths that ever emanated from the mind of man, or 
ever entered into a deceitful heart. He who so artfully could pervert the truiii 
falls the victim of facts stated by himself. 

t Richardson's Travels, vol. 11. n. 204. 

* Ho 



172 PHILISTIA, ETC. 

diction and a recorded fact, and present such a view of 
the existing state of Philistia as renders it difficult to 
determine, from the strictest accordance that prevails be- 
tween both, whether the inspired penman or the defamer 
of Scripture give the more vivid description. Nor is 
there any obscurity whatever, in any one of the circum- 
stances, or in any part of the proof. The coincidence is 
too glaring, even for wilful blindness not to discern ; and 
to all the least versed in general history the priority of 
the predictions to the events is equally obvious. And 
such was the natural fertility of the country, and such 
was the strength and celebrity of the cities, that no con- 
jecture possessing the least shadow of plausibility can 
be formed in what manner any of these events could 
possibly have been thought of, even for many centuries 
after "the vision and prophecy" were sealed. After that 
period Gaza defied the power of Alexander the Great, 
and withstood for two months a hard-pressed siege. The 
army with which he soon afterward overthrew the 
Persian empire having there, as well as at Tyre, been 
checked or delayed in the first flush of conquest, and he 
himself having been twice wounded in desperate attempts 
to storm the city, the proud and enraged King of Mace- 
don, with all the cruelty of a brutish heart, and boasting 
. of himself as a second Achilles, dragged at his chariot 
wheels the intrepid general who had defended it twice 
around the walls of Gaza.* Ashkelon was no less cele- 
brated for the excellence of its wines than for the strength 
of its fortifications.f And of Ashdod it is related by an 
eminent ancient historian, not only that it was a great 
city, but that it withstood the longest siege recorded in 
history (it may almost be said either of prior or of later 
date), having been besieged for the space of twenty-nine 
years by Psymatticus, king of Egypt. J Strabo, after the 
commencement of the Christian era, classes its citizens 
among the chief inhabitants of Syria. Each of these 
cities, Gaza, Ashkelon, and Ashdod, was the see of a 
bishop from the days of Constantine to the invasion of 
the Saracens. And, as a decisive proof of their exist- 
ence as cities long subsequent to the delivery of the pre-, 
dictions, it may further be remarked, that different coins 
of each of these very cities are extant, and are copied 

* Quinti Curtii, lib. iv. cap. 26. | Relandi Palest. 341, 586. 

t Herodot. Hist. lib. ii. cap. 157. 



PHILIST1A, ETC. 173 

and described in several accounts of ancient coins.* The 
once princely magnificence of Gaza is still attested by 
the " ruins of white marble ;" and the house of the present 
aga is composed of fragments of ancient columns, cor- 
nices, &c; and in the courtyard, and immured in the 
wall, are shafts and capitals of granite columns.! 

In short, cottages for shepherds, and folds for flocks, par- 
tially scattered along the seacoast, are now truly the best 
substitutes for populous cities that the once powerful 
realm of Philistia can produce ; and the remnant of that 
land which gave titles and grandeur to the lords of the 
Philistines is destroyed. Gaza, the chief of its satrapies, 
" the abode of luxury and opulence," now bereaved of its 
king, and bald of all its fortifications, is the defenceless 
residence of a subsidiary ruler of a devastated province ; 
and, in kindred degradation, ornaments of its once splen- 
did edifices are now bedded in a wall that forms an en- 
closure for beasts. A handful of men could now take 
unobstructed possession of that place, where a strong 
city opposed the entrance, and defied, for a time, the 
power of the conqueror of the world. The walls, the 
dwellings, and the people of Ashkelon have all perished ; 
and though its name was in the time of the crusades 
shouted in triumph throughout every land in Europe, 
it is now literally without an inhabitant. And Ashdod, 
which withstood a siege treble the duration of that of 
Troy, and thus outrivalled far the boast of Alexander at 
Gaza, has, in verification of " the word of God, which is 
sharper than any two-edged sword," been cut off, and has 
fallen before it to nothing. 

There is yet another city which was noted by the 
prophets, the very want of any information respecting 
which, and the absence of its name from several modern 
maps of Palestine, while the sites of other ruined cities 
are marked, are really the best confirmation of the truth 
of the prophecy that could possibly be given. Ekron shall 
be rooted up. It is rooted up. It was one of the chief 
cities c$. the Philistines ; but though Gaza still subsists, 
and while Ashkelon and Ashdod retain their jiames in 
their ruins, the very name of Ekron is missing.J 

* Relandi Palest, p. 595, 609, 797. f General Straton's MS. 

% In the map prefixed to Dr. Shaw's Travels, Akron is indeed marked ; but 
it is placed close upon the seacoast, whereas Ekron was situated in the inte- 
rior, and was at least ten miles distant. Shaw did not visit the spot. Br 
Richardson passed some ruins near to Ashdod, and conjectures that they wera 
15* 



174 PHILIST1A, ETC. 

The wonderful contrast in each particular, whether in 
respect to the land or to the cities- of the Philistines, is 
the exact counterpart of the literal prediction; and 
having the testimony of Volney to all the facts, and also 
indisputable evidence of the great priority of the predic- 
tions to the events, what more complete or clearer proof 
could there be that each and all of them emanated from 
the prescience of Heaven? 

The remaining boundary of Judea was the mountains 
of Lebanon on the north. Lebanon was celebrated for 
the extent of its forests, and particularly for the size and 
excellence of its cedars.* It abounded also with the 
pine, the cypress, and the vine, &c. But, describing what 
it now is, Volney says, " Towards Lebanon the mountains 
are lofty, but they are covered in many places with as 
much earth as fits them for cultivation by industry and 
labour. There, amid the crags of the rocks, may be seen 
the not very magnificent remains of the boasted cedars."f 
The words of the prophets of Israel answer the sarcasm, 
and convert it into a testimony of the truth : — " Lebanon 
is ashamed, and hewn down. The high ones of stature 
shall be hewn down; Lebanon shall fall mightily. "J 
"Upon the mountains, and in all the valleys, his branches 
are fallen ; to the end that none of all the trees by the 
water exalt themselves for their height, neither shoot 
up their top among the thick boughs. "§ " Open thy 
doors, O Lebanon, that the fire may devour thy cedars. 

probably Ekron. But neither does the site of them correspond with that of 
Ekron, which, according to Eusebius, lay between Ashdod andJamnia, towards 
the east, or inland. Vide Relan. Pal. 77. Any diversity of opinion respecting 
its site is not the least conclusive proof that it is rooted up. 

* Relandi Palest, p. 320, 379. Tacit. Hist. lib. v. cap. vi. 

t Travels, vol. i. p. 292. — Volney remarks in a note, that there are but four or 
five of those trees which deserve any notice ; and in a note, it may be added, 
from the words of Isaiah, — the rest of the trees of his forest shall be few, that a 
child may write them, c. x. 19. Could not the infidel write a brief note, or state 
a minute fact, without illustrating a prophecy? Maundrell, who visited Leba- 
non in the end of the seventeenth century, and to whose accuracy in other 
matters all subsequent travellers who refer to him bear witness, describes 
some of the cedars near the top of the mountain as " very old, and of a pro- 
digious bulk, and others younger of. a smaller size." Of the former he could 
reckon up only sixteen. He measured the largest, and found it above twelve 
yards in girth. Such trees, however few in number, show that the cedars of 
Lebanon had once been no vain boast. But after the lapse of more than a 
century, not a single tree of such dimensions is now to be seen. Of those 
■which now remain, as visited by Captains Irby and Mangles, there are about 
fifty in whole, on a single small eminence, from which spot the cedars are the 
only trees to be seen in Lebanon, p. 209. 

; Isa. xxxiii. 9 ; x. 33, 44. $ Ezek.xxxi. 12, 14. 



SUMMARY OF THE PROPHECIES. 175 

The cedar is fallen; the forest of the vintage is come 
down."* 

Such are the prophecies which explicitly and avow- 
edly referred to the land of Judea and to the surround- 
ing states. And such are the facts drawn from the nar- 
ratives of travellers, and given, in general, in their own 
words, which substantiate their truth; though without 
any allusion, but in a few solitary instances, to the pre- 
dictions which they amply verify. The most unsuspected 
evidence has been selected ; and the far greater part is 
so fully corroborated and illustrated by other testimony, 
as to bid defiance to skepticism. The prophecies and the 
proofs of their fulfilment are so numerous, that it is im- 
possible to concentrate them in a single view without 
the exclusion of many ; and they are, upon a simple com- 
parison, so obvious and striking, that any attempt at their 
further elucidation must hazard the obscuring of their 
clearness and the enfeebling of their force. There is 
no ambiguity in the prophecies themselves, for they can 
bear no other interpretation but what is descriptive of 
the actual events. There can be no question of their 
genuineness or antiquity, for the countries whose future 
history they unveiled contained several millions of in- 
habitants, and numerous flourishing cities, at a period 
centuries subsequent to the delivery, the translation, and 
publication of the prophecies, and when the regular and 
public perusal of their Scriptures was the law and the 
practice of the Israelites ; and they have only gradually 
been reduced to their existing state of long-prophesied 
desolation. There could not possibly have been any 
human means of the foresight of facts so many and so 
marvellous ; for every natural appearance contradicted, 
and ever)'' historical fact condemned the supposition : 
and nothing but continued oppression and a succession 
of worse than Gothic desoiators, — no government on 
earth but the Turkish, no spoliators but the Arabs, 
could have converted such natural fertility into such utter 
and permanent desolation. Could it have been foreseen, 
that, after the lapse of some hundred years, no interval 
of prosperity or peaceful security would occur through- 
out many ensuing generations, to revive its deadened 
energies, or to rescue from uninterrupted desolation one 
of the richest and one of the most salubrious regions 

* Zech. xi. 1, 2. 



176 SUMMARY OF THE PROPHECIES 

of the world, which the greater part of these territories 
naturally is ? Could the present aspect of any country, 
with every alterable feature changed, and with every 
altered feature marked, have been delineated by different 
uninspired mortals, in various ages from 2200 to 3300 
years past ] And there could not, so far as all researches 
have hitherto reached, be a more triumphant demonstra- 
tion, from existing facts, of the truth of manifold pro- 
phecies. In reference to the complete historical truth of 
the predictions respecting the successive kings of Syria 
and Egypt, Bishop Newton emphatically remarks (as Sir 
Isaac Newton's observations had previously proved) that 
there is not so concise and comprehensive an account 
of their affairs to be found in any author of these times ; 
that the prophecy is really more perfect than any single 
history, and that no one historian hath related so many 
circumstances as the prophet has foretold : so that " it 
was necessary to have recourse to several authors for 
the better explaining and illustrating the great variety of 
particulars contained in the prophecy." The same re- 
mark, in the same words, may, more obviously, and with 
equal truth, be now applied to the geographical as well as 
to the historical proof of the truth of prophecy. Judea, 
which, before the age of the prophets, had, from the uni- 
formity and peculiarity of its government and laws, re- 
mained unvaried in a manner and to a degree unusual 
among nations, has since undergone many convulsions, 
and has for many generations been unceasingly subjected 
to reiterated spoliation. And now, after the lapse of 
more than twenty centuries, travellers see what prophets 
foretold. Each prediction is fulfilled in all its particulars, 
so far as the facts have (and in almost every case they 
have) been made known. But while the recent discov- 
eries of many travellers have disclosed the state of these 
countries, each of their accounts presents only an im- 
perfect delineation ; and a variety of these must be com- 
bined before they bring fully into view all those diversi- 
fied, discriminating, and characteristic features of the 
extensive scene which were vividly depicted of old, in 
all their minute lines, and varied shades, by the pencil 
of prophecy, and which set before us, as it were, the 
history, the land, and the people of Palestine. 
i Judea trodden down by successive desolators, — re- 
maining uncultivated from generation to generation, — 
the general devastation of the country, — the mouldering- 



CONCERNING JUDEA ETC. 177 

ruins of its many cities, — the cheerless solitude of its 
once happy plains, — the wild produce of its luxuriant 
mountains, — the land covered with thorns, — the high- 
ways waste and untrodden, — its ancient possessors scat- 
tered abroad, — the inhabitants thereof depraved in char- 
acter, few in number, eating their bread with careful- 
ness, or in constant dread of the spoiler or oppressor, — 
the insecurity of property, — the uselessness of labour, — 
the poverty of their revenues, — the land emptied and de- 
spoiled, — instrumental music ceased from among them 
— the mirth of the land gone, — the use of wine prohibited 
in a land of vines, — and the wine itself bitter unto them 
that drink it ; — some very partial exceptions from uni- 
versal desolation, some rescued remnants, like the glean- 
ings of a field, and emblems of the departed glory of 
Judea, the devastation of the land of Ammon, the ex- 
tinction of the Ammonites, — the destruction of all their 
cities, — their country a spoil to the heathen, — and a per- 
petual desolation ; — the desolation of Moab, — its cities 
without any to dwell therein, and no city escaped, — the 
valley perished, the plain destroyed, — the wanderers 
that have come up against it, and that cause its inhabit- 
ants to wander, — the manner of the spoliation of the 
dwellers in Moab, their danger and insecurity in the plain 
country, and flying to the rocks for a refuge and a home, 
— while flocks lie down among the ruins of the cities, 
none there to make them afraid, — and the despoiled and 
impoverished condition of some of its wretched wander- 
ers ; — I dumea untrodden andunvisited by travellers, — the 
scene of an unparalleled and irrecoverable desolation, — 
its cities utterly abandoned and destroyed, — of the greater 
part of them no traces left — a desolate wilderness, over 
which the line of confusion is stretched out, — the coun- 
try bare, — no kingdom there, — its princes and nobles 
nothing, and empty sepulchres their only memorials, — 
thistles and thorns in its palaces, — a border of wicked- 
ness, — and yet greatly despised, — wisdom perished from 
Teman, and understanding out of the mount of Esau, — 
abandoned to birds and beasts and reptiles, specified by 
name, — its ancient possessors cut off for ever, and no 
one remaining of the house of Esau ; — the destruction 
of the cities of the Philistines, — cottages for shepherds 
and folds for flocks, along the seacoast, — the remnant 
of the plain destroyed and unoccupied by any fixed in- 
habitant :— -Lebanon ashamed, its cedars, few anddiminu- 
H3 



178 NINEVEH. 

five, now a mockery instead of a praise; — and, finally, 
the different fate of many cities particularly denned, — 
the long subjection of Jerusalem to the Gentiles, — the 
buildings of Samaria cast down into the valley, its foun- 
dations discovered, and vineyards in its stead, all so 
clearly marked, both in the prophecy and on the spot, 
that they serve to fix its site, — Rabbah-Ammon, the 
capital of the Ammonites, now a pasture for camels, and 
a couching-place for flocks, — the chief city of Edom 
brought down, — a court for owls, and no man dwelling 
in it, — the forsaken Gaza, bereaved of a monarch, bald 
of all its fortifications, or defenceless, — Ashkelon, deso- 
late, without an inhabitant, — and Ekron rooted up : these 
are all ancient prophecies, and these are all present facts, 
which form of themselves a phalanx of evidence which 
all the shafts of infidelity can never pierce. 

Though the countries included in these predictions 
comprehend a field of prophecy extending over upwards 
of one hundred and twenty thousand square miles, the 
existing state of every part of which bears witness of 
their truth ; yet the prophets, as inspired by the God of 
nations, foretold the fate of mightier monarchies, of more 
extensive regions, and of more powerful cities : and there 
is not a people, nor a country, nor a capital which was 
then known to the Israelites whose future history they 
did not clearly reveal. And, instead of adducing argu- 
ments from the preceding very abundant materials, or 
drawing those facts already adduced to their legitimate 
conclusion, they may be left in their native strength, 
like the unhewn adamant; and we may pass to other 
proofs which also show that the temple of Christian faith 
rests upon a rock that cannot be shaken. 



CHAPTER VI. 



NINEVEH. 



To a brief record of the creation of the antediluvian 
world, and of the ^dispersion and the different settlements 
of mankind after - the deluge, the Scriptures of the Old 
Testament add a full and particular history of the He- 



NINEVEK. 179 

brews for the space of fifteen hundred years, from the 
days of Abraham to the era of the last of the prophets. 
While the historical part of Scripture thus traces, from 
its origin, the history of the world, the prophecies give a 
prospective view which reaches to its end. And it is 
remarkable that profane history, emerging from fable, 
becomes clear and authentic about the very period when 
sacred history terminates, and when the fulfilment of 
these prophecies commences, which refer to other na- 
tions besides the Jews. 

Nineveh, the capital of Assyria, was for a long time 
an extensive and populous city. Its walls are said, by 
heathen historians, to have been a hundred feet in height, 
sixty miles in compass, and to have been defended by 
fifteen hundred towers, each two hundred feet high. Al- 
though it formed the subject of some of the earliest of 
the prophecies, and was the very first which met its pre- 
dicted fate, yet a heathen historian, in describing its 
capture and destruction, repeatedly refers to an ancient 
prediction respecting it. Diodorus Siculus relates, that 
the King of Assyria, after the complete discomfiture of 
his army, confided in an old prophecy, that Nineveh 
would not be taken unless the river should become the 
enemy of the city ;* that, after an ineffectual siege of two 
years, the river, swollen with long-continued and tem- 
pestuous torrents, inundated part of the city, and threw 
down the wall for the space of twenty furlongs ; and 
that the king, deeming the prediction accomplished, de- 
spaired of his safety, and erected an immense funeral 
pile, on which he heaped his wealth, and with which 
himself, his household, and palace were consumed.! 
The book of Nahum was avowedly prophetic of the de- 
struction of Nineveh : and it is there foretold " that the 
gates of the river shall be opened, and the palace shall 
be dissolved." " Nineveh of old, like a pool of water — 
with an overflowing flood he will make an utter end of 
the place thereof."J The historian describes the facts 
by which the other predictions of the prophet were as 
literally fulfilled. He relates that the King of Assyria, 
elated with his former victories, and ignorant of the re- 
volt of the Bactrians, had abandoned himself to scan- 
dalous inaction ; had appointed a time of festivity, and 
supplied his soldiers with abundance of wine ; and that 

* Diod. Sic. lib. ii. p. 82, 83. Ed. Wessel. 1793. 
t Ibid. p. 84. % Nahum ii. 6 • « 8. 



180 NINEVEH. 

the general of the enemy, apprized, by deserters, of their 
negligence and drunkenness, attacked the Assyrian army 
while the whole of them were fearlessly giving way to 
indulgence, destroyed great part of them, and drove the 
rest into the city.* The words of the prophet were 
hereby verified : " While they be foiden together as 
thorns, and while they are drunken as drunkards, they 
shall be devoured as stubble full dry."f The prophet 
promised much spoil to the enemy : " Take the spoil of 
silver, take the spoil of gold ; for there is no end of the 
store and glory out of all the pleasant furniture. "J And 
the historian affirms, that many talents of gold and silver, 
preserved from the fire, were carried to Ecbatana.^ Ac- 
cording to Nahum, the city was not only to be destroyed 
by an overflowing flood, but the fire also was to devour 
it ;|| and, as Diodorus relates, partly by water, partly by 
fire, it was destroyed. 

The utter and perpetual destruction and desolation of 
Nineveh were foretold : — " The Lord will make an utter 
end of the place thereof. Affliction shall not rise up the 
second time. She is empty, void, and waste. — The Lord 
will stretch out his hand against the north, and destroy 
Assyria, and will make Nineveh a desolation, and dry 
like a wilderness. How is she become a desolation, a 
place for beasts to lie down in \"% In the second century, 
Lucian, a native of a city on the banks of the Euphrates, 
testified that Nineveh was utterly perished — that there 
was no vestige of it remaining — and that none could 
tell where once it was situated. This testimony of Lu- 
cian, and the lapse of many ages during which the place 
was not known where it stood, render it at least some- 
what doubtful whether the remains of an ancient city, 
opposite to Mosul, which have been described as such by 
travellers, be indeed those of ancient Nineveh. It is, 
perhaps, probable that they are the remains of the city 
which succeeded Nineveh, or of a Persian city of the 
same name, which was built on the banks of the Tigris 
by the Persians subsequently to the year 230 of the 
Christian era, and demolished by the Saracens in 632.** 
In contrasting the then existing great and increasing 
population, and the accumulating wealth of the proud 

* Diod. Sic. lib. ii. p. 81, 84. t Nahum i. 10 ; iii. 2. 

t Ibid. ii. 9. $ Diod. p. 87. || Nahum iii. 15. 

m Nahum i. 8, 9 ; ii. 10 ; iii. 17, 18, 10. Zeph. ii. 13, 14, 15. 
** Marshami Can. Ckron. sec. xvii. p. 600. Ed. Franeq. 1606 



NINEVEH. 181 

inhabitants of the mighty Nineveh, with the utter ruin 
that awaited it, — the word of God (before whom all the 
inhabitants of the earth are as grasshoppers; by Nahum 
was — " Make thyself many as the canker-worm, make 
thyself many as the locusts. Thou hast multiplied thy 
merchants above the stars of heaven : the canker-worm 
spoileth, and flyeth away. Thy crowned are as the 
locusts, and thy captains as the great grasshoppers which 
camp in the hedges in the cold day : but when the sun 
riseth, they flee away ; and their place is not known 
where they are," or were. Whether these words imply 
that even the site of Nineveh would in future ages be 
uncertain or unknown ; or, as they rather seem to inti- 
mate, that every vestige of the palaces of its monarchs, 
of the greatness of its nobles, and of the wealth of its 
numerous merchants would wholly disappear ; the truth 
of the prediction cannot be invalidated under either in- 
terpretation. The avowed ignorance respecting Nine* 
veh, and the oblivion which passed over it, for many an 
age, conjoined with the meagerness of evidence to iden- 
tify it still, prove that the place was long unknown where 
it stood, and that, even now, it can scarcely with cer- 
tainty be determined. And if the only spot that bears 
its name, or that can be said to be the place where it 
was, be indeed the site of one of the most extensive of 
cities on which the sun ever shone, and which continued 
for many centuries to be the capital of Assyria — the 
" principal mounds," few in number, which " show neither 
bricks, stones, nor other materials of building, but are in 
many places overgrown with grass, and resemble the 
mounds left by intrenchments and fortifications of an- 
cient Roman camps," and the appearances of other mounds 
and ruins less marked than even these, extending for ten 
miles, and widely spread, and seeming to be " the wreck 
of former buildings,"* show that Nineveh is left without 
one monument of royalty, without any token whatever 
of its splendour or wealth ; that their place is not known 
where they were ; and that it is indeed a desolation — 
" empty, void, and waste," its very ruins perished, and 
less than the wreck of what it was. " Such an utfer 
ruin" in every view, " has been made of it ; and such is 
the truth of the divine predictions."! 

* Buckingham's Travels in Mesopotamia, vol. ii. p. 49, 51, 62. 
t See Bishop Nev T tcn's Dissertations, 

16 



182 BABYLON. 



BABYLON. 

If ever there was a city that seemed to bid defiance to 
any predictions of its fall, that city was Babylon. It 
was, for a long time, the most famous city in the whole 
world.* Its walls, which were reckoned among the 
wonders of the world, appeared rather like the bulwarks 
of nature than the workmanship of man.f The temple 
of Belus, half a mile in circumference and a furlong in 
height — the hanging gardens, which, piled in successive 
terraces, towered as high as the walls — the embankments 
which restrained the Euphrates — the hundred brazen 
gates — and the adjoining artificial lake — all displayed 
many of the mightiest works of mortals concentrated in 
a single spot.J Yet, while in the plenitude of its power, 
and, according to the most accurate chronologers, 160 
years before the foot of an enemy had entered it, the 
voice of prophecy pronounced the doom of the mighty 
and unconquered Babylon. A succession of ages brought 
it gradually to the dust ; and the gradation of its fall is 
marked till it sink at last into utter desolation. At a 
time when nothing but magnificence was around Babylon 
the great, fallen Babylon was delineated exactly as every 
traveller now describes its ruins. And the prophecies 
concerning it may be viewed connectedly, from the period 
of their earliest to that of their latest fulfilment. 

The immense fertility of Chaldea, which retained also 

* Plinii Hist. Nat. lib. v. cap. 26. 

t The extent of the walls of Babylon is variously stated : by Herodotus at 
480 stadia, or furlongs, in circumference ; by Pliny and Solinus at sixty Roman 
miles, or of equal extent ; by Strabo at 385 stadia ; by Diodorus Siculus, 
according to the slightly different testimony of Ctesias and Clitarchus, both 
of whom visited Babylon, at 360 or 365 ; and to the last of these statements 
that of Quintus Curtius nearly corresponds, viz. 368. The difference of a 
few stadia rather confirms than disproves the general accuracy of the last 
three of these accounts. There may have been an error in the text of Herodotus 
of 480, instead of 380, which Pliny and Solinus may have copied. The varia- 
tion of 20 or 25 stadia, in excess, may have been caused by the line cf mea- 
surement having been the outside of the trench, and not immediately of the 
wall. And thus the various statements may be brought nearly to correspond. 
Major Rennel, estimating the stadium at 491 feet, computes the extent of the 
wall at 34 miles, or eight and a half on each side. The opposite and contra- 
dictory statements of the height and breadth of the wall may possibly be best 
reconciled on the supposition that they refer to different periods. Herodotus 
states the height to have been 200 cubits, or 300 feet, and the breadth 50 cubits, 
or 75 feet. According to Curtius, the height was 150 feet, and the breadth 32; 
while Strabo states the heigh' at 75 feet, and the breadth at 32 feet. 

t Herod, lib. i. c. 178. Diodor. Sic. lib. U. p. 26. Plin. lib. v. c. 26. Quint! 
Cur. lib v. c. 4 



BABYLON. 183 

the name of Babylonia till after the Christian era,* cor- 
responded, if that of any country could vie, with the 
greatness of Babylon. It was the most fertile region 
of the whole east.f Babylonia was one vast plain, 
adorned and enriched by the Euphrates and the Tigris, 
from which, and from the numerous canals that inter- 
sected the country from the one river to the other, water 
was distributed over the fields by manual labour and 
by hydraulic machines,! giving rise, in that warm climate 
and rich, exhaustless soil, to an exuberance of produce 
without a known parallel, over so extensive a region, 
either in ancient or modern times. Herodotus states, 
that he knew not how to speak of its wonderful fertility, 
which none but eyewitnesses would credit ; and, though 
wruing in the language of Greece, itself a fertile coun- 
try, he expresses his own consciousness that his descrip- 
tion of what he actually saw would appear to be improb- 
able, and to exceed belief. In his estimation, as well as 
in that of Strabo and of Pliny (the three best ancient 
authorities that can be given), Babylonia was of all 
countries the most fertile in corn, the soil never produc- 
ing less, as he relates, than two hundred fold, an amount, 
in our colder regions, scarcely credible, though Strabo, 
the first of ancient geographers, agrees with the " father 
of history" in recording that it reached even to three 
hundred, the grain, too, being of prodigious size.§ After 
being subjected to Persia, the government of Chaldea 
was accounted the noblest in the Persian empire. |] 
Besides supplying horses for military service, it main- 
tained about seventeen thousand horses for the sove- 
reign's use. And, exclusive of monthly subsidies, the 
supply from Chaldea (including perhaps Syria) for the 
subsistence of the king and of his army amounted to a 
third part of all that was levied from the whole of the 
Persian dominions, which at that time extended from the 
Hellespont to India.^f Herodotus incidentally mentions 
that there were four great towns in the vicinity of 
Babylon. 

Such was the " Chaldee's excellency," that it departed 
not on the first conquest, nor on the final extinction of 
its capital ; but one metropolis of Assyria arose after 

* Strabo, lib. xvi. p. 743. 

t A gram totius orientis fertilissimum.- Plin. Hist. IS/at. lib. v. c. 26. 
t Herod, lib. i. c. 192. $ Ibid. Strabo, lib xvi. p. 742. 

I! Herod, lib. i.e. 102. If Ibid. 



184 BABYLON. 

another in the land of Chaldea, when Babylon had ceased 
to be " the glory of kingdoms." The celebrated city of 
Seleucia, whose ruins attest its former greatness, was 
founded and built by Seleucus Nicator, king of Assyria, 
one of the successors of Alexander the Great, in the 
year before Christ 293, — three centuries after Jeremiah 
prophesied. In the first century of the Christian era it 
cont lined six hundred thousand inhabitants.* The Par- 
thian kings transferred the seat of empire to Cte siphon, 
on the opposite bank of the Tigris, where they resided 
in winter ; and that city, formerly a village, became great 
and powerful.f Six centuries after the latest of the 
predictions, Chaldea could also boast of other great 
cities,J such as Artemita and Sitacene, besides many 
towns. When invaded by Julian it was a " fruitful and 
pleasant country." And at a period equally distant from 
the time of the prophets and from the present day, in 
the seventh century, Chaldea was the scene of vast 
magnificence, in the reign of Chosroes. " His favourite 
residence of Artemita or Destagered, was situated beyond 
the Tigris, about sixty miles to the north of the capital 
(Ctesiphon). The adjacent pastures," in the words of 
Gibbon, " were covered with flocks and herds ; the para- 
dise, or park, was replenished with pheasants, peacocks, 
ostriches, roebucks, and wild boars, and the noble game 
of lions and tigers was sometimes turned loose for the 
golden pleasures of the chase. Nine hundred and sixty 
elephants were maintained for the use and splendour of 
the great king; his tents and baggage were carried into 
the field by twelve thousand great camels, and eight 
thousand of a smaller size ; and the royal stables were 
filled with six thousand mules and horses. Six thousand 
guards successively mounted before the palace gate, and 
the service of the interior apartments was performed by 
twelve thousand slaves. The various treasures of gold, 
silver, gems, silk, and aromatics were deposited in a 
hundred subterranean vaults."^ "In the eighth cen- 
tury, the towns of Samarah, Horounieh, and Djasserik 
formed, so to speak, one street of twenty-eight miles."j] 

* Plin. lib. v. c. 26. | Strabo, lib. xvi. p. 743. 

X Ibid. p. 744. § Gibbon's History, c. 46, vol. iv. p. 423. 

j| Malte Brun's Geography, vol. ii. p. 119. Historical documents are not 
wanting to prove that the richness of Chaldea, down to the time of the Arabian 
califs, was such as to give the charm of truth (which, indeed, it is generally 
admitted that they possess) to many of the splendid descriptions which abound 
in the otherwise fictitious narratives of the Arabian Nights' Entertainments. 



BABYLON. 185 

Chaldea, with its rich soil and warm climate, and inter- 
sected by the Tigris and Euphrates, was one of the last 
countries in the world of which the desolation could 
have been thought of by man. For to this day " there 
cannot be a doubt, that if proper means were taken, the 
country would with ease be brought to a high state of 
cultivation."* 

Manifold are the prophecies respecting Babylon antf 
the land of the Chaldeans ; and the long lapse of ages 
has served to confirm their fulfilment in every particular, 
and to render it at last complete. The judgments of 
Heaven are not casual, but sure ; they are not arbitrary, 
but righteous. And they were denounced against the 
Babylonians and the inhabitants of Chaldea expressly 
because of their idolatry, tyranny, oppression, pride, 
covetousness, drunkenness, falsehood, and other wick- 
edness. So debasing and brutifying was their idolatry, 
— or so much did they render the name of religion sub- 
servient to their passions, — that practices the most abom- 
inable, which were universal among them, formed the 
very observance of some of their religious rites, of 
which even heathen writers could not speak but in terms 
of indignation and abhorrence. Though enriched with 
a prodigality of blessings, the glory of God was not 
regarded by the Chaldeans; and all the glory of man 
with which the plain of Shinar was covered has become, 
in consequence as well as in chastisement of prevailing 
vices, and of continued though diversified crimes, the 
wreck, the ruin, and utter desolation which the word of 
God (for whose word but his ]) thus told from the begin- 
ning that the event would be. 

The burden of Babylon, which Isaiah the son of Amos 
did see. — " The noise of a multitude in the mountains, 
like as of a great people: a tumultuous noise of the 
kingdoms of nations gathered together : the Lord of 
Hosts mustereth the host of the battle. They come 
from a far country, from the end of heaven, even the 
Lord and the weapons of his indignation, to destroy the 
whole land. — Behold, the day of the Lord cometh, cruel 
both with wrath and fierce anger, to lay the land deso- 
late : and he shall destroy the sinners thereof out of it. 
Babylon, the glory of kingdoms, the beauty of the Chal- 
dees' excellency, shall be as when God overthrew Sodom 

* Bombay Philosophical Transactions, vol. i. p. 124. 
16* 



186 BABYLON. 

and Gomorrah. It shall never be inhabited, neither shall 
it be dwelt in from generation to generation : neither 
shall the Arabian pitch tent there; neither shall the 
shepherds make their fold there. But wild beasts of the 
desert shall lie there : and their houses shall be full of 
doleful creatures ; and owls shall dwell there, and satyrs 
shall dance there. And the wild beasts of the island 
shall cry in their desolate houses, and dragons in their 
pleasant palaces."* " Thou shalt take up this proverb 
against the King of Babylon, and say, How hath the 
oppressor ceased! the golden city ceased ! Thy pomp 
is brought down to the grave, and the noise of thy viols : 
the worm is spread under thee, and the worms cover 
thee. — Thou shalt be brought down to hell, to the sides 
of the pit. Thou art cast out of the grave like an abomi- 
nable branch — I will cut off from Babylon the name 
and remnant, the son and nephew, saith the Lord. I 
will also make it a possession for the bittern and pools 
of water : and I will sweep it with the besom of destruc- 
tion, saith the Lord of Hosts."f " Babylon is fallen, is 
fallen ; and all the graven images of her gods he hath 
broken unto the ground. "J " Thus saith the Lord, that 
saith unto the deep, be dry ; and I will dry up thy rivers : 
that saith of Cyrus, he is my shepherd, and shall perform 
all my pleasure, — and I will loose the loins of kings, to 
open before him the two-leaved gates; and the gates 
shall not be shut."§ " Bel boweth down," &c.|| " Come 
down, and sit in the dust, virgin daughter of Baby- 
lon : sit on the ground, there is no throne, O daughter 
of the Chaldeans. Sit thou silent, and get thee into 
darkness, O daughter of the Chaldeans : for thou shalt 
no more be called the lady of kingdoms. Thou hast 
said, I shall be a lady for ever. — Hear now this, thou 
that art given to pleasures, that dwellest carelessly, that 
sayest in thine heart, I am, and none else besides me ; I 
shall not sit as a widow, neither shall I know the loss of 
children. But these two things shall come to thee in a 
moment, in one day, the loss of children and widow- 
hood : they shall come upon thee in their perfection, for 
the multitude of thy sorceries, and for the great abun- 
dance of thine enchantments. For thou hast trusted in 
thy wickedness, &c. Therefore shall evil come upon 

* Isa. xiii. 1, 4, 5, 9, 19-22. f Ibid. xiv. 4, 11, 19, 22, 23. 

j Ibid. xxi. 9. $ Ibid. xliv. 27, 28; xlv. 1. 

U Ibid. xlvi. 1. 



BABYLON. 187 

thee ; thou shalt not know from whence it riseth ; and 
mischief shall come upon thee ; thou shalt not be able to 
put it off: and desolation shall come upon thee suddenly, 
which thou shalt not know."* 

" I will punish the land of the Chaldeans, and will 
make it perpetual desolations. And I will bring upon that 
land all my words which I have pronounced against it, 
even all that is written in this book which Jeremiah hath 
prophesied against all the nations. For many nations 
and great kings shall serve themselves of them also : 
and I will recompense them according to their deeds, 
and according to the works of their own hands."f " The 
word that the Lord spake against Babylon and against 
the land of the Chaldeans by Jeremiah the prophet. De- 
clare ye among the nations, and publish, and set up a 
standard ; publish, and conceal not ; say, Babylon is 
taken, Bel is confounded, Merodach is broken in pieces ; 
her idols are confounded, her images are broken in pieces. 
For out of the north there cometh up a nation against 
her, which shall make her land desolate, and none shall 
dwell therein ; they shall remove, they shall depart, both 
man and beast."! " For, lo, I will raise and cause to 
come up against Babylon an assembly of great nations 
from the north country : and they shall set themselves 
in array against her ; from thence she shall be taken : 
their arrows shall be as of a mighty expert man ; none 
shall return in vain. And Chaldea shall be a spoil ; all 
that spoil her shall be satisfied, saith the Lord. Behold 
the hindermost of the nations shall be a wilderness, a 
dry land and a desert. Because of the wrath of the Lord 
it shall not be inhabited, but it shall be wholly desolate ; 
every one that goeth by Babylon shall be astonished, and 
hiss at all her plagues."^ " Her foundations are fallen, 
her walls are thrown down ; for it is the vengeance of the 
Lord : take vengeance upon her ; as she hath done, do 
unto her. Cut off the sower from Babylon, and him that 
handleth the sickle in the time of harvest ; for fear of 
the oppressing sword they shall turn every one to his 
people, and they shall flee every one to his own land."|| 
— " Go up against the land of Merathaim, even against 
it, and against the inhabitants of Pekod; waste and 
utterly destroy after them. — A sound of battle is in the 

* Isa. xlvii. 1, 5, 7-11- t J«*?. xxv. 13-J4, 

f Jer. 1. 1, 2, 3. $ Ibid. 0-13. U Ibid. 15, 16 



188 BABYLON. 

land, and of great destruction. How is the hammer of 
the whole earth cut asunder and broken ! how is Baby- 
lon become a desolation among the nations ! I have laid 
a snare for thee, and thou art also taken, O Babylon, and 
thou wast not aware : thou art found, and also caught, 
because thou hast striven against the Lord. The Lord 
hath opened his armory, and hath brought forth the 
weapons of his indignation : for this is the work of the 
Lord God of Hosts in the land of the Chaldeans. Come 
against her from the utmost border, open her store- 
houses ; cast her up as heaps, and destroy her utterly, 
let nothing of her be left."* " Let none thereof escape ; 
and the most proud shall stumble and fall, and none shall 
raise him up ; I will kindle a fire in his cities, and it shall 
devour all round about him."f " A sword is upon the 
Chaldeans, saith the Lord, and upon the inhabitants of 
Babylon, and upon her princes, and upon her wise men. 
A sword is upon the liars ; — a sword is upon her mighty 
men; — a sword is upon their horses, and upon their 
chariots, and upon all the mingled people that are in the 
midst of her ; — a sword is upon her treasures ; and they 
shall be robbed. A drought is upon her waters ; and 
they shall be dried up : for it is the land of graven images, 
and they are mad upon their idols. Therefore the wild 
beasts of the desert, with the wild beasts of the islands, 
shall dwell there, and the owls shall dwell therein ; and 
it shall be no more inhabited for ever ; neither shall it 
be dwelt in from generation to generation. As God over- 
threw Sodom and Gomorrah, and the neighbour cities 
thereof, saith the Lord, so shall no more man abide 
there, neither shall any son of man dwell therein. Be- 
hold, a people shall come from the north, and a great 
nation and many kings shall be raised up from the coasts 
of thi earth. They shall hold the bow and the lance ; 
they are cruel, and will not show mercy; their voice 
shall roar like the sea, and they shall ride on horses, 
every one put in array, like a man to the battle, against 
thee, O daughter of Babylon. — Behold he shall come up 
like a lion from the swelling of Jordan into the habitation 
of the strong : but I will make them suddenly run away 
from her : and who is a chosen man, that I may appoint 
over her 1 For who is like me ] And who will appoint 
me the time 1 And who is that shepherd that will stand 

* Jer. 1. 21-26. t Ibid. 29, 32. 



BABYLON 189 

before me 1 Therefore hear ye the counsel of the Lord 
that he hath taken against Babylon; and his purposes 
that he hath purposed against the land of the Chaldeans ; 
surely the least of the flock shall draw them out ; surely 
he shall make their habitation desolate with them."* — I 
will send unto Babylon fanners that shall fan her, and 
shall empty her land. — The slain shall fall in the land of 
the Chaldeans. — Babylon is suddenly fallen and de- 
stroyed ; howl for her ; take balm for her pain, if so be 
she may be healed. We would have healed Babylon, but 
she is not healed ; forsake her, and let us go every one 
unto his own country ; for her judgment reacheth unto 
heaven, and is lifted up even to the skies.f — The Lord 
hath raised up the spirit of the kings of the Medes ; for 
his device is against Babylon to destroy it, &c. — O thou 
that dwellest upon many waters, abundant in treasures, 
thin^ end is come, and the measure of thy covetousness. 
The Lord of Hosts hath sworn by himself, saying, Surely 
I will fill thee with men, as with caterpillars ; and they 
shall lift up a shout against thee. J — Behold, I am against 
thee, O destroying mountain, saith the Lord, which de- 
stroyest all the earth ; and I will stretch out mine hand 
upon thee, and roil thee down from the rocks, and I will 
make thee a burnt mountain. — Set up a standard in the 
land, blow the trumpet among the nations, prepare the 
nations against her, call together against her the king- 
doms of Ararat, Minni, and Aschenaz ; prepare against 
her the nations, with the kings of the Medes, the captains 
thereof, and all the rulers thereof, and all the land of his 
dominion. And the land shall tremble and sorrow ; for 
every purpose of the Lord shall be performed against 
Babylon, to make the land of Babylon a desolation with- 
out an inhabitant. The mighty men of Babylon have 
forborne to fight, they have remained in their holds ; 
their might hath failed; they became as women: they 
have burnt her dwelling-places ; her bars are broken. — 
One post shall run to meet another, and one messenger 
to meet another, to show the King of Babylon that his city 
is taken at one end ; and that the passages are stopped. 
— Thus sairh the Lord of Hosts, the God of Israel, The 
daughter of Babylon is like a threshing-floor — it is time 
to thresh her : yet a little while, and the time of her har- 
vest shall come:$ — I will dry up her sea, and make 

* Jer. 1 . 35-45. \ Ibid. li. 2, 8, 9. % Ibid. 11, 13, 14. $ Ibid. 25-33, 



190 BABYLON. 

her springs dry. And Babylon shall become heaps, a 
dwelling-place for dragons, an astonishment, and an hiss- 
ing, without an inhabitant. — In their heat I will make 
their feasts, — that they may sleep a perpetual sleep, and 
not wake : — how is the praise of the whole earth sur- 
prised! how is Babylon become an astonishment among 
the nations ! The sea is come upon Babylon ; she is 
covered with the multitude of the waves thereof. Her 
cities are a desolation, a dry land and a wilderness, a 
land wherein no man dwelleth, neither doth any son of 
man pass thereby. And I will punish Bel in Babylon ; 
and I will bring forth out of his mouth that which he 
hath swallowed up : and the nations shall not flow to- 
gether any more unto him ; yea, the wall of Babylon 
shall fall — a rumour shall come one year, and after that 
in another year shall come a rumour, and violence in the 
land, ruler against ruler. Therefore, behold, the days 
come that I will do judgment upon the graven images of 
Babylon : and her w T hole land shall be confounded, and 
all her slain shall fall in the midst of her, &c* And I 
will make drunk her princes and her wise men, her cap- 
tains, and her rulers, and mighty men : and they shall 
sleep a perpetual sleep, and not wake, saith the King, 
whose name is the Lord of Hosts. Thus saith the Lord 
of Hosts, The broad walls of Babylon shall be utterly 
broken, and her high gates shall be burned with fire ; and 
the people shall labour in vain, and the folk in the fire, 
and they shall be weary. — And it shall be when thou 
hast made an end of reading this book, that thou shalt 
bind a stone to it, and cast it into the midst of Euphrates : 
and thou shalt say, Thus shall Babylon sink, and shall 
not rise from the evil that I will bring upon her.f 
j The enemies who were to besiege Babylon, the cow- 
ardice of the Babylonians, the manner in which the city 
was taken, and all the remarkable circumstances of the 
siege were foretold and described by the prophets as the 
facts are related by ancient historians. 
( Go up, O Elam (or Persia) ; besiege, O Media. The 
Lord hath raised up the spirit of the kings of the Medes, 
for his device is against Babylon to destroy it. The kings 
of Persia and Media, prompted by a common interest, 
freely entered into a league against Babylon, and with 
one accord entrusted the command of their united armies 

* 1st. \l 36, 37, 39, 41 42, 43, 44, 45, 47. f Itid. 57, 58, 63, 61 



BABYLON. 191 

«> Cyrus,* the relative, and eventually the successor of 
tnemboth. — But the taking of Babylon was not reserved 
for these kingdoms alone : other nations had to be pre- 
pared against her. 

Set up a standard in the land : blow the trumpet among 
the nations, prepare the nations against her, call together 
against her the kingdoms of Ararat, Minnl, and Aschenaz ; 
Lo, I will raise and cause to come up against Babylon an 
assembly of great nations from the north country, &c. — ■ 
Cyrus subdued the Armenians, who had revolted against 
Media, spared their king, bound them over anew to their 
allegiance by kindness rather than by force, and incor- 
porated their army with his own.f He adopted the Hyr- 
caneans, who had rebelled against Babylon, as allies and 
confederates with the Medes and Persians-! He con- 
quered the united forces of the Babylonians and Lydians, 
took Sardis, with Croesus and all his wealth, spared his 
life after he was at the stake, restored to him his family 
and his household, received him into the number of his 
counsellors and friends, and thus prepared the Lydians* 
over whom he reigned, and who were formerly combined 
with Babylon, for coming up against it.§ He overthrew 
also the Phrygians and Cappadocians, and added their 
armies in like manner to his accumulating forces. || And 
by successive alliances and conquests, by proclaiming 
liberty to the slaves, by a humane policy, consummate 
skill, a pure and noble disinterestedness, and a boundless 
generosity, he changed, within the space of twenty years, 
a#confederacy which the King of Babylon had raised up 
against the Medes and Persians, whose junction he feared, 
into a confederacy even of the same nations against Baby- 
lon itself, — and thus a standard was set up against Baby- 
lon in many a land, kingdoms were summoned, prepared, 
and gathered together against her ; and an assembly of great 
nations from the north — including Ararat and Minni, or 
the greater and lesser Armenia, and Aschenaz, or, accord- 
ing to Bochart, Phrygia — were raised up, and caused to 
come against Babylon* Without their aid, and before 
they were subjected to his authority, he had attempted 
in vain to conquer Babylon ; but when he had prepared 
and gathered them together, it was taken, though by ar- 
tifice more than by power. 

* Xenoph. Cyrop. lib. i. p. 53. Ed. Hutch. Glas. 1821. 

f Ibid. 1. iii. p. 158. % Ibid. 1. iv. p. 215, 217. 

§ Ibid. 1. ii. p. 408-416. [| Ibid. 1. iv. p. 427, 423 



192 BABYLON. 

they shall hold the bow and the lance — they shall ride 
upon horses — let the archer bend his bow — all ye that bend 
the bow shoot at her. They rode upon horses. Forty thou- 
sand Persian horsemen were armed from among the na- 
tions which Cyrus subdued; many horses of the captives 
were besides distributed among all the allies. And Cyrus 
came up against Babylon with a great multitude of horse ;* 
— and also with a great multitude of archers and javelin 
menf — that held the boio and the lance. 

No sooner had Cyrus reached Babylon, with the na- 
tions which he had prepared and gathered against her, 
than, in the hope of discovering some point not utterly im- 
pregnable, accompanied by his chief officers and friends, 
he rode round the walls, and examined them on every 
side, after having for that purpose stationed his whole 
army round the city. J They camped against it round about. 
They put themselves in array against Babylon round about. 

Frustrated in the attempt to discover, throughout the 
whole circumference, a single assailable point, and find 
ing that it was not possible, by any attack, to make him- 
self master of walls so strong and so high, and fearing 
that his army would be exposed to the assault of the 
Babylonians by a too extended and consequently weak- 
ened line, — Cyrus, standing in the middle of his army, 
gave orders that the heavy-armed men should move, in 
opposite directions, from each extremity towards the 
centre ; and the horse and light-armed men being nearer 
and advancing first, and the phalanx being redoubled and 
closed up, the bravest troops thus occupied alike the front 
and the rear, and the less effective were stationed in the 
middle. § Such a disposition of the army, in the estima- 
tion of Xenophon,- himself a most skilful general, was 
well adapted both for fighting and preventing flight ; while 
the Christian, judging differently of their successive move- 
ments, may here see the fulfilment of one prediction after 
another. For as in this manner " they stood facing 
the walls," in regular order and not as a disorderly and 
undisciplined host, though composed of various nations, 
they set themselves in array against Babylon, every man put 
in array. 

A trench was dug round the city — towers were erected 
— Babylon was besieged — the army was divided into 

* XenopU. Cyrop. p. 428. t Tbid. p. 429. 

(. Ibid. $ Ibid. p. 430. 



BABYLON. 193 

twelve parts, that each, monthly by turn, might keep 
watch throughout the year ;* — and though the orders 
were given by Cyrus, the command of the Lord of Hosts 
was unconsciously obeyed — let none thereof escape. 

The mighty men of Babylon have forborne to fight. They 
have remained in their holds ; their might hath failed, they 
became as women* Babylon had been the hammer of the 
whole earth, by which nations were broken in pieces, and 
kingdoms destroyed. Its mighty men carried the terror 
of their arms to distant regions, and led nations captive. 
But they were dismayed, according to the word of the 
God of Israel, whenever the nations which he had stirred 
up against them stood in array before their walls. Their 
timidity, so clearly predicted, was the express complaint 
and accusation of their enemies, who in vain attempted 
to provoke them to the contest. Cyrus challenged their 
monarch to single combat, but also in vain ;f for the hands 
of the King of Babylon waxed feeble. Courage had departed 
from both prince and people ; and none attempted to 
save their country from spoliation, or to chase the assail- 
ants from their gates. They sallied not forth against 
the invaders and besiegers, nor did they attempt to disjoin 
and disperse them, even when drawn all around their walls 
and comparatively weak along the extended line. Every 
gate was still shut ; and they remained in their holds. Being 
as unable to rouse their courage, even by a close block- 
ade, and to bring them to the field, as to scale or break 
down any portion of their stupendous walls or to force 
their gates of solid brass, Cyrus reasoned that the greater 
that was their number, the more easily would they be 
starved into surrender, and yield to famine, since they 
would not contend with arms nor come forth to fight. — 
And hence arose, for the space of two years, his only 
hope of eventual success. So dispirited became its peo- 
ple, that Babylon, which had made the world as a wilder- 
ness, was long unresistingly a beleaguered town. But, 
possessed of many fertile fields and of provisions for 
twenty years, which in their timid caution they had plen- 
tifully stored, they derided Cyrus from their impregnable 
walls, within which they remained.% Their profligacy, 
their wickedness, and false confidence were unabated ; 
they continued to live carelessly in pleasures, but their 
might did not return : and Babylon the great, unlike to 

* Xenoph. Cyrop. p. 430-434. t Ibid. 1. v. p. 290. 

% Ibid. 1. vii. p. 434. Herod. 1. i. c. 19C 
17 I 



1 94 BABYLON. 

many a small fortress and unwalled towi , made not one 
effort to regain its freedom or to be rid of the foe. 

Much time having been lost, and no progress having 
been made in the siege, the anxiety of Cyrus was 
strongly excited, and he was reduced to great perplex- 
ity, when at last it was suggested and immediately de- 
termined on, to turn the course of the Euphrates. But 
the task was not an easy one. The river was a quarter 
of a mile broad, and twelve feet deep, and in the opinion 
of one of the counsellors of Cyrus, the city was stronger 
by the river than by its walls. Diligent and laborious 
preparation was made for the execution of the scheme, 
yet so as to deceive the Babylonians. And the great 
trench, ostensibly formed for the purpose of blockade, 
which for the time it eifectually secured, was dug around 
the walls on every side, in order to drain the Euphrates, 
and to leave its channel a straight passage into the city, 
through the midst of which it flowed. But in the words 
of Herodotus, " if the besieged had either been aware of 
the designs of Cyrus, or had discovered the project 
before its actual accomplishment, they might have ef- 
fected the total destruction of their troops. They had 
only to secure the little gates which led to the river, and 
to man the embankment on either side, and they might 
have enclosed the Persians as in a net, from which they 
could never have escaped."* Guarding as much as pos- 
sibly they could against such a catastrophe, Cyrus pur- 
posely chose, for the execution of his plan, the time of a 
great annual Babylonish festival, during which, according 
to their practice, " the Babylonians drank and revelled 
the whole night." And while the unconscious and reck- 
less citizens " were engaged in dancing and merriment," 
tho river was suddenly turned into the lake, the trench, 
and the canals ; and the watchful Persians, both foot and 
horse, so soon as the subsiding of the water permitted, 
entered by its channel, and were followed by the allies in 
array, on the dry part of the river.f " / will dry up thy 
sea, and make thy springs dry. That saith to the deep, Be 
dry, I will dry up thy rivers. 

" One detachment was placed where the river first 
enters the city, and another where it leaves it. "J And 
one post did run to meet another, and one messenger to meet 
another, to show the King of Babylon that his city is taken at 

* Herod, lib. i. c. 191. 

t Herod, ibid. Xenoph. Cyrop. 1. vii. p. 434-437. + Herod, lib. l. 191. 



BABYLON. 195 

the end, and that the passages are shut, " They were 
taken," says Herodotus, " by surprise ; and such is the 
extent of the city, that, as the inhabitants themselves 
affirm, they who lived in the extremities were made 
prisoners before any alarm was communicated to the 
centre of the place,"* where the palace stood. Not a 
gate of the city wall was opened ; not a brick of it had 
fallen. But a snare ivas laid for Babylon — it was taken, 
and it was not aware ; it was found and also caught, for it 
had sinned against the Lord. How is the praise of the 
whole earth surprised ! For thou hast trusted in thy wicked- 
ness, and thy wisdom, and thy knowledge, it hath perverted, 
thee, therefore shall evil come upon thee, and thou shalt not 
know from whence it riseth, and mischief shall come upon 
thee, and thou shalt not be able to put it off, &c. — None shall 
save thee. 

In their heat I will make their feasts, and I will make 
them drunken, that they may rejoice and sleep a perpetual 
sleep, and not wake, saith the Lord. I will bring them 
down like lambs to the slaughter, &c. I will make drunken 
her princes and her wise men, her captains, and her 
rulers, and her mighty men, and they shall sleep a per- 
petual sleep, &c. Cyrus, as the night drew on, stimu- 
lated his assembled troops to enter the city, because 
in that night of general revel within the walls many 
of them were asleep, many drunk, and confusion uni- 
versally prevailed. On passing, without obstruction 
or hinderance, into the city, the Persians, slaying some, 
putting others to flight, and joining with the revellers, 
as if slaughter had been merriment, hastened by the 
shortest way to the palace, and reached it ere yet a 
messenger had told the king that his city was taken. 
The gates of the palace, which was strongly fortified, 
were shut. The guards stationed before them were 
drinking beside a blazing light when the Persians rushed 
impetuously upon them. The louder and altered clam- 
our, no longer joyous, caught the ear of the inmates of 
the palace, and the bright light showed them the work 
of destruction, without revealing its cause. And noc 
aware of the presence of an enemy in the midst of Baby- 
lon, the king himself (who, as every Christian knows, 
had been roused from his revelry by the handwriting on 
the wall), excited by the warlike tumult at the gates, com- 

Ferort. lio. i. 191. 

12 



196 BABYLON 

manded those within to examine f /om whence it arose ; 
and according to the same word, by which the gates 
(leading from the river to the city) were not shut, the 
loins of kings were loosed to open before Cyrus the two- 
leaved gates. At the first sight of the opened gates of 
the palace of Babylon, the eager Persians sprang in. 
The King of Babylon heard the report of them — anguish 
took hold of him, — he and all who were about him per- 
ished : God had numbered his kingdom and finished it : 
it was divided, and given to the Medes and Persians ; 
the lives of the Babylonian princes, and lords, and rulers, 
and captains closed with that night's festival : the 
drunken slept a perpetual sleep, and did not wake.* 

Her young men shall fall in the streets, and all her men 
of war shall be cut off in that day. Cyrus sent troops 
of horse throughout the streets, with orders to slay all 
who were found there. — And he commanded proclama- 
tion to be made, in the Syrian language, that all who 
were in their houses should remain within ; and that, if 
any one were found abroad, he should be killed. These 
orders were obeyed.f They shall wander every man to 
his quarter, 

I will fill thee with men as with caterpillars. Not only 
did the Persian army enter with ease as caterpillars, 
together with all the nations that had come up against 
Babylon, but they seemed also as numerous. Cyrus, 
after the capture of the city, made a great display of his 
cavalry in the presence of the Babylonians, and in the 
midst of Babylon. Four thousand guards stood before 
the palace gates, and two thousand on each side. These 
advanced as Cyrus approached ; two thousand spearmen 
followed them. These were succeeded by four square 
masses of Persian cavalry, each consisting of ten thou- 
sand men : and to these again were added, in their order, 
the Median, Armenian, Hyrcanian, Caducian, and Sacian 
horsemen, — all, as before, riding upon horses, every man in 
array, — with lines of chariots, four abreast, concluding 
the train of the numerous hosts.J — Cyrus afterward re- 
viewed, at Babylon, the whole of his army, consisting of 
one hundred and twenty thousand horse, two thousand 
chariots, and six hundred thousand foot.§ Babylon, 
which was taken when not aware, and within whose 
walls no enemy, except a captive, had been ever seen, 

* Herod, lib. i. c. 191. Xen Cvr 1 vn. p. 434 439. t Ibid. p. 439. 

J Ibid. 1. viii. p. 494-495 $ Ibid. p. 532. 



BABYLON. 197 

was also filled with men as with caterpillars, as if there had 
not been a wall around it. — The Scriptures do not relate 
the manner in which Babylon was taken, nor do they 
ever allude to the exact fulfilment of the prophecies. 
But there is, in every particular, a strict coincidence 
between the predictions of the prophets and the histori- 
cal narratives both of Herodotus and Xenophon. 

On taking Babylon suddenly, and by surprise, Cyrus, 
as had been literally prophesied concerning him, and as 
the sign by which it was to be known that the Lord 
had called him by his name (Isa. xlv. 1-4),* became 
immediately possessed of the most secret treasures of 
Babylon. No enemy had ever dared to rise up against 
that great city. To take it seemed not aw r ork for man to 
attempt ; but it became the easy prey of him who was 
called the servant of the Lord. And as at this day, — 
from the perfect representation given by the prophets 
of every feature of fallen Babylon, now at last utterly 
desolate, — men may know that God is the Lord, seeing 
that all who have visited and describe it show that the 
predicted judgments against it have been literally ful- 
filled; so, at that time, Cyrus — who for two years 
could only look on the outer side of the outer wall of 
Babylon, and who had begun to despair of reducing it by 
famine — was to know by the treasures of darkness, and 
hidden riches of secret places being given into his hand, that 
the Lord, which had called him by his name, was the God of 
Israel. And when the appointed time had come that 
the power of their oppressor was to be broken, Babylon 
was taken ; and when the similarly prescribed period of 
the captivity of the Jews, for whose sake he was called, 
had expired, Cyrus was their deliverer. 

Thus saith the Lord to his anointed, to Cyrus, whose 
right hand I have holden, to subdue nations before him. 
Cyrus, commencing his career with a small army Oi 
Persians, not only succeeded to the kingdom of the 
Medes and Persians, first united under him, but the Hyr- 
canians yielded also voluntarily to his authority. He 
subdued the Syrians, Assyrians, Arabs, Cappadocians, 
both Phrygias, the Lydians, Carians, Phenicians, and 
Babylonians. He governed the Bactrians, Indians, and 
Cilicians, and also the Sacians, Paphlagonians, and 

* Isaiah prophesied above one hundred and sixty years before the taking of 
Babylon, two hundred and fifty years before Herodotus, and nearly three hun- 
dred and fifty before Xenophon. 

17* 



198 BABYLON. 

Mariandinians, and other nations. He likewise reduced 
to his authority the Greeks that were in Asia, and the 
Cyprians and Egyptians.* Nations were thus subdued 
before him. 

I will stir up the Medes against them, ivhich shall not 
regard silver; and as for gold they shall not delight in it. 
He who was called the anointed of the Lord was free 
from covetousness. His character is drawn by Xenophon 
(who states that he excelled all other kings) as the 
model of a wise and generous prince. The liberality of 
Cyrus was more noble than the mere possession of im- 
mensity of wealth, though including both the riches of 
Croesus and the treasures of Babylon. He reckoned 
that his riches belonged not any more to himself than 
to his friends.f And he made, as well as pronounced, it 
his object to use and not to hoard his wealth, and to apply 
it to the reward of his servants, and in relief of their 
wants. So little did he regard silver, or delight in gold, 
that Croesus told him that by his liberality he would 
make himself poor, instead of storing up vast treasures 
to himself.J The Medes possessed, in this respect, the 
spirit of their chief, of which an instance recorded by 
Xenophon is too striking and appropriate to be passed 
over. When Cobryas, an Assyrian governor, whose son 
the King of Babylon had slain, hospitably entertained 
him and his army, Cyrus appealed to the chiefs of the 
Medes and Hyrcanians, and to the noblest and most 
honourable of the Persians, whether, giving first what 
was due unto the gods, and leaving to the rest of the 
army their portion, they would not overmatch his gene- 
rosity by ceding to him their whole share of the first and 
plentiful booty, which they had won from the land of 
Babylon. Loudly applauding the proposal, they imme- 
diately and unanimously consented ; and one of them 
said, " Cobryas may have thought us poor, because we 
came not loaded with coins, and drink not out of golden 
cups ; but by this he will know, that men can be generous 
even without gold."§ — 4s for gold they did not delight 
in it. 

Cobryas, it may be presumed, was stirred up and pre- 
pared by gratitude on the one hand, as well as by revenger 
on the other, to go up against Babylon. And it may be 

* Xm Cyr. lib. i. p. 45. t Ibid. lib. viii. p. 516. 

X Ibid. p. 482. $ Ibid. lib. v. p. 289. 



BABYLON. 199 

mentioned, he was afterward the first to lead the way to 
the palace ; and — for, though a great deep, the judgments 
of God are altogether righteous — his hand was among 
those who slew the murderer of his son. 

None shall return in vain. The walls of Babylon 
were incomparably the loftiest and the strongest ever 
built by man. They were constructed of such stupen- 
dous size and strength on very purpose that no possibility 
might exist of Babylon ever being taken. And, if ever 
confidence in bulwarks could not have been misplaced, 
it was when the citizens and soldiery of Babylon, who 
feared to encounter their enemies in the field, in perfect 
assurance of their safety and beyond the reach of the 
Parthian arrow, scoffed from the summit of their im- 
pregnable walls the hosts which encompassed them. 
But though the proud boast of a city so defended, and 
that had never been taken, that it would stand for ever, 
seemed scarcely presumptuous ; yet subsequently to 
the delivery of the prophecies concerning it, Babylon 
was not only repeatedly taken, but was never once be- 
sieged in vain. Cyrus, indeed, departed, after he first 
appeared before its walls, but he went to prepare and 
gather together the nations against it. And he did not 
return in vain. But this prediction, as it is applicable 
also to all others, is true, not of him only, but also of 
all who, in after-ages, came up against Babylon. It fell 
before every hand that was raised against it; yet its 
greatness did not depart, nor was its glory obscured in a 
day. Cyrus was not its destroyer ; but he sought, by 
wise institutions, to perpetuate its pre-eminence among 
the nations. He left it to his successor in all its strength 
and magnificence. Rebelling against Darius, the Baby- 
lonians made preparations for a siege, and bade defiance 
to the whole power of the Persian empire. Fully re- 
solved not to yield, and that famine might never reduce 
them to submission, they adopted the most desperate 
and barbarous resolution of putting every woman in the 
city to death, with the exception of their mothers, and 
one female, the best beloved in every family, to bake 
their bread. All the rest were assembled together and 
strangled.* These two things shall come upon thee in a 
moment, in one day, the loss of children and widowhood, 
they shall come upon thee in their perfection, for the multi" 

* Herod. 1. iii. c. 150. Tom. iii. 160, ed. Foul 



200 BABYLON. 

tude of thy sorceries, and for the great abundance of thine 
enchantments. For thou hast trusted in thy wickedness, &c. 
They did come upon them in their perfection, when their 
wives and children were strangled by their own hands ; 
and so suddenly, as before, in a moment, in one day, did 
these things come upon them, that the victims w^ere 
assembled for the sacrifice ; so general was the instant 
widowhood, that fifty thousand women were afterward 
taken, in proportionate numbers, from the different 
neighbouring provinces of the empire, to replace those 
who had been slain ; and the very reservation of their 
mothers multiplied the lamentations for the loss of chil- 
dren. But trust in their wickedness brought them no 
safety. For, while they were thus instrumental in the 
infliction of one grievous judgment, for which such mur- 
derers were ripe ; their iniquity was not thereby lessened, 
and therefore, at however great a price, they procured 
not any security against another judgment, which also 
had been denounced against Babylon for its wickedness. 
They deemed themselves absolutely secure against 
famine and against assault. The artifice of Cyrus could 
not again be a snare ; and an attempt to renew it w r as, 
along with every other, entirely frustrated. But still it 
was not in vain that Darius besieged Babylon. 

In the twentieth month of the siege, a single Persian, 
whose body was covered over with the marks of stripes 
and with blood, and whose nose and ears had been newly 
cut off, presented himself at one of the gates of Baby- 
lon, — a helpless object of pity, and, if not a great crimi- 
nal, indeed, the obvious victim of wanton and savage 
cruelty. He had fled, or escaped, from the camp of the 
enemy. But he was not a common deserter, such as 
they might not have admitted within their walls, — but it 
was Zophyrus, who was well known as one of the chief 
nobles of Persia. He represented to the Babylonians 
that, not for any crime, but for the honest advice winch 
he had given to Darius to raise the siege, as the taking 
of the city seemed to all impossible ; the enraged tyrant 
(his pride wounded, or his fears perhaps awakened, that 
his army would be discouraged by such counsel) had in- 
flicted upon him the severest cruelties, caused him to be 
mutilated as they saw, and to be scourged, of which his 
whole body bore the marks ; — to one of his proud spirit 
and high rank disgrace was worse than suffering ; and 
tie came to join the revolters, his soul burning for ven- 



BABYLON. 201 

geance against their common tyrant. " And now," ad- 
dressing them, he said, " I come for the greatest good to 
you, for the greatest evil to Darius, to his army, and to 
the Persians. The injuries which I have suffered shall 
not be unrevenged, for I know, and will disclose all his 
designs." 

On such proofs, and cheered by such hopes, the Baby- 
lonians did not doubt the sincerity of Zophyrus, nor his 
devotion to their cause, identified, as it clearly seemed, 
with the only hope of revenge against the cruel author 
of his wrongs, towards whom they could not conceive 
but that he would cherish an inflexible hatred. He 
sought but to fight against their enemies. At his request, 
they gladly and unhesitatingly intrusted him with a 
military command. Forgiveness of injuries was not 
then reckoned a virtue, — which it is too seldom practi- 
cally accounted even in a Christian land ; and vengeance, 
still called honour, sleeps not in an unforgiving breast. 
Zophyrus soon satisfied the Babylonians that his wrongs 
would not long be unavenged. To their delight, having 
watched the first opportunity, he sallied forth from the 
gates of Semiramis, on the tenth day after his entrance 
into the city, and falling suddenly on a thousand of the 
enemy, slew them every one. After an interval of only 
seven days, twice that number were, in like manner, 
slain, near to the Ninian gates. The men of Babylon 
were animated with new vigour and new hopes ; and 
the praise of Zophyrus was on every tongue. He re- 
ceived a higher command. , But the Persians, seemingly 
more wary, were nowhere open to attack for the space 
of twenty days. On the expiry of that period, how- 
ever, Zophyrus, by a noted exploit, again proved himself 
worthy of still greater authority, by leading out his 
troops from the Chaldean gates, and killing, in one spot, 
four thousand men. In reward for such services, and 
such tried fidelity, skill, and courage, as none, they 
thought, could be more worthy of the honour and of 
the trust, they not only raised him to the chief com- 
mand of their army, but appointed him to the dignified 
and most responsible office in Babylon, which it was 
his aim to attain, that of (ruxo^vXai) guardian of their 
walls.* 

Darius, as if to be secure against the continued repe- 

* Herod, c. 152-157, p. 166-1T3. 

13 



202 BABYLON. 

tition of such desultory carnage of his troops, advanced 
with all his army to the walls. They were manned to 
repel the assault. But the treachery of Zophyrus, how- 
ever incredible, and unknown and unsuspected alike by 
the Babylonians and the Persians, became immediately 
apparent. Intrusted as he was, in virtue of his office, with 
the gates of the city, no sooner had the enemy ap- 
proached, and the armed citizens ascended the wall, than 
he opened the Belidian and the Cissian gates, close to 
which the choicest Persian troops were stationed.* The 
whole scheme was a preconcerted snare, known only to 
Darius and Zophyrus, and invented solely by the latter, 
the mutilation of whose body was his own voluntary 
act. To the glory of the deed were added the greatest 
gifts and honours, and the governorship of Babylon with- 
out tribute, for his reward. The numbers of the different 
detachments of the Persian troops who fell, their posi- 
tions, and the precise time of their successive advance- 
ments, had all been resolved on and arranged. And 
Darius as freely sacrificed the lives of seven thousand 
men as Zophyrus had inflicted incurable wounds upon 
himself. " Thus," says Herodotus, " was Babylon a sec- 
ond time taken." And thus was the word of God, — from 
whom nothing, past, present or future, can be hid, — a 
second time fulfilled against Babylon — none shall return 
in vain, 

Babylon was a third time taken by Alexander the 
Great. Mazaeus, the Persian general, surrendered the 
city into his hands, and he entered it with his army 
drawn up " as if they were marching to battle. "f Again 
was it filled with men — and literally was every man put in 
array, like a man to the battle. The siege of so fortified a 
city{ would have been a work of great difficulty and 
labour, even to the conqueror of Asia. But the inhabit- 
ants eagerly flocked upon the walls to see their new king, 
and exchanged, without a struggle, the Persian for the 
Macedonian yoke. — Babylon was afterward succes- 
sively taken by Antigonus, by Demetrius, by Antiochus 
the Great, and by the Parthians. But whatever king or 
nation came up against it, none returned in vain. 

Each step in the progress of the decline of Babylon 
was the accomplishment of a prophecy. Conquered, 

* Herod, c. 15S-159. 

t Quadrato agmine, quod ipse ducebat, velut in aciem irent, ingredi suoa 
jubet ~-Q,uin. Cur. lib. v. c. 3. t — Tarn munits urbis. — Ibid. 



BABYLON. 203 

tor the first time,* by Cyrus, it was afterward reduced 
from an imperial to a tributary city. Come down and sit 
in the dust, O virgin daughter of Babylon : sit on the ground, 
there is no throns, O daughter of the Chaldeans. — After 
the Babylonians rebelled against Darius, the walls were 
reduced in height, and all the gates destroyed.! The 
wall of Babylon shall fall, her walls thrown down. — Xerxes, 
after his ignominious retreat from Greece, rifled the tem- 
ples of Babylon, J the golden images alone in which 
were estimated at 20,000,000/., besides treasures of vast 
amount. / will punish Bel in Babylon, and I will bring 
forth out of his mouth that which he has swallowed up ; Iivill 
do judgment upon the graven images of Babylon.^ — Alex- 
ander the Great attempted to restore it to its former 
glory, and designed to make it the metropolis of a uni- 
versal empire. But, while the building of the temple of 
Belus, and the reparation of the embankments of the 
Euphrates were actually carrying on, the conqueror of 
the world died, at the commencement of this his last un- 
dertaking, in the height of his power, and in the flower 
of his age. || Take balm for her pain, if so be that she may 
be healed. We would have healed Babylon, but she is not 
healed.f — The neighbouring city of Seleucia, which was 
built with that intent, was the chief cause of the decline 
of Babylon as a city, and drained it of great part of its 
population.** And at a later period, or about 130 years 
before the birth of Christ, Humerus, a Parthian governor, 
who was noted as excelling all tyrants in cruelty, exer- 
cised great severities on the Babylonians, and having 
burned the forum and some of the temples, and destroyed 
the fairest parts of the city, reduced many of the inhabit- 
ants to slavery on the slightest pretexts, and caused 
them, together with all their households, to be sent into 
Media. ft They shall remove, they shall depart, both man 
and beast.~\X 

The " golden city" thus gradually verged for centuries 
towards poverty and desolation. — Notwithstanding that 
Cyrus resided chiefly at Babylon, and sought to reform 
the government and remodel the manners of the Baby- 

* Herod, lib. i. c. 191. t Ibid. lib. iii. c. 150. 

X Ibid. lib. i. c. 183- Arrian. de Expeditione Alex. lib. vii. c. 17, cited by 
Bishop Newton. 

fc Jer. li. 44, 47, 52. || Arrian. lib. vii. c. 17. Strabo, lib. xvi. p. 738. 

IT Jer. li. 8, 9. ** Plin. Hist. Nat. lib. v. c. 26. 

tr Diod. Siculi fragmentum, apud Valesium. Vide Vitnn. com. in lesaiam, 

cap. 13, p. 420,421 tt Jer. 1. 3. 



204 BABYLON. 

lonians, the succeeding kings of Persia preferred, as the 
seat of empire, Susa, Persepolis, or Ecbatana, situated 
in their own country : and in like manner the successors 
of Alexander did not attempt to complete his purpose 
of restoring Babylon to its pre-eminence and glory ; but, 
after the subdivision of his mighty empire, the very kings 
of Assyria, during their temporary residence even in 
Chaldea, deserted Babylon, and dwelt in Seleucia. And 
thus the foreign inhabitants, first Persians, and afterward 
Greeks, imitating their sovereigns by deserting Babylon, 
acted as if they verily had said, — Forsake her, and let us 
go every man unto his own country ; for her judgment is 
reached unto heaven, and is lifted up even to the slues. 

But kindred judgments — the issue of common crimes 
— rested on the land of Chaldea, as well as on its doomed 
metropolis ; and the tracing of their fulfilment may best 
lead to the view of the utter desolation of fallen Babylon. 

They come from afar country, from the end of the earth, 
to destroy the whole land* Many nations and great kings 
shall serve themselves of thee also, &c. The Persians, the 
Macedonians, the Parthians, the Romans, the Saracens, 
and the Turks are the chief of the many nations who 
have unscrupulously and unsparingly served themselves 
of the land of the Chaldeans : and Cyrus and Darius, 
kings of Persia ; Alexander the Great ; and Seleucus, 
king of Assyria ; Demetrius, and Antiochus the Great ; 
Trajan, Severus, Julian, and Heraclius, emperors of 
Rome ; the victorious Omar, the successor of Mahomet ; 
— Holagou, and Tamerlane, are great kings who succes- 
sively subdued or desolated Chaldea, or exacted from it 
tribute to such an extent as scarcely any other country 
ever paid to a single conqueror. And — though the names 
of some of these nations were unknown to the Babylo- 
nians, and unheard of in the world at the time of the 
prophecy — most of these many nations and great kings 
need now but to be named to show that, in local relation 
to Chaldea, they came from the utmost border— -from the 
coasts of the earth. 

They are cruel both in anger and fierce wrath to lay the 
land desolate, &c. The Persians vied with the Par- 
thians in cruelty and fierceness against resisting and 
against subjugated enemies. Three thousand Babylo- 
nians were at once impaled by order of Darius. Con- 
quest was the object, and kindness was not in the nature 
of the Macedonian conquerors of Babylon The pos- 



BABYLON. 205 

session of Chaldea was contested between Antigonus 
and Seleucus, and ruler rose against ruler. After its long 
subjection to the Seleucidse, the proverbially cruel Par- 
thians held Babylonia in bondage. In the second cen- 
tury of the Christian era, the Romans, coming from afar, 
still maintained the character of the cruel and fierce des- 
olators of Chaldea, and were thus the unconscious instru- 
ments of the fulfilment of other prophecies. Under the 
reign of Marcus, the Roman generals penetrated as far as 
Ctesiphon and Seleucia. They were received as friends 
by the Greek colony ; they attacked as enemies the seat 
of the Parthian kings ; yet both cities experienced the 
same treatment. The sack and conflagration of Seleucia, 
ivith the massacre of three hundred thousand of the inhabit- 
ants, tarnished the glory of the Roman triumph. Seleu- 
cia sunk under the fatal blow ; but Ctesiphon, in about 
thirty-three years, had sufficiently recovered its strength 
to maintain an obstinate siege against the emperor Se- 
verus. Ctesiphon was thrice besieged, and thrice taken 
by the predecessors of Julian."* And when attacked 
by Julian, the anger of that Roman emperor and that of 
his army was not moderated, nor their cruelty abated, by 
the effectual resistance of the citizens of Ctesiphon 
against sixty thousand besiegers. " The fields of Assyria 
were devoted by Julian to the calamities of war ; and 
the philosopher retaliated on a guiltless people the acts 
of rapine and cruelty which had been committed by their 
haughty master in the Roman provinces. The Persians 
beheld from the walls of Ctesiphon the desolation of the 
adjacent country."! With such, violence did he wreak 
his vengeance on the inhabitants of Chaldea that their 
fierce wrath was conjoined with the cruelty of their ene- 
mies to lay the land desolate, " The extensive region 
that lies between the river Tigris and the mountains of 
Media was filled with villages and towns ; and the fertile 
soil for the most part was in a very improved state of 
cultivation. But on the approach of the Romans, this 
rich and smiling prospect was instantly blasted. Wher- 
ever they moved the inhabitants deserted the open vil- 
lages and took shelter in the fortified towns ; the cattle 
were driven away; the grass and ripe corn were con- 
sumed with fire ; and as soon as the flames had subsided 
which interrupted the march of Julian, he beheld the 

* Giobon, vol. i. c. viii. p. 212. | lb. vol. ii- c, xxiv. n. 3G9. 

18 



206 BABYLON. 

melancholy face of a smokjng and naked desert."* But 
"the second city of the province, large, populous, and well 
fortified," in vain resisted a fierce and desperate assault ; 
and a large breach having been made by a battering-ram in 
the walls, " the soldiers of Julian rushed impetuously into 
the town, and after the full gratification of every military 
appetite, Perisabor was reduced to ashes ; and the 
engines which assaulted the citadel were planted on the 
ruins of the smoking houses"] When, in after-ages, the 
Romans, under Heraclius, penetrated to the royal seat 
of Destagered, and spread over Chaldea to the gates of 
Ctesiphon, " whatever could not be easily transported 
they consumed with fire, that Chosroes might feei the 
anguish of those wounds which he had so often inflicted 
on the provinces of the empire : and justice might allow 
the excuse," says Gibbon, "if the desolation had been 
confined to the works of regal luxury, if national hatred, 
military license, and religious zeal had not wasted with 
equal rage the habitations and the temples of the guiltless 
subjects. "J The fierce Abassides, proverbially reckless 
of committing murder, which was the very work that 
their missionaries went forth to execute, long reigned 
over Chaldea ; and Bagdad, its new capital, distant about 
fifteen miles from Seleucia and Ctesiphon, was their im- 
perial seat for fLYe hundred years. § — " Their daggers, 
their only arms, were broken by the sword of Holagou, 
and except the word assassin, not a vestige is left of the 
enemies of mankind "\ — for again and again has it proved 
true of the land of Chaldea — I will destroy the sinners 
thereof out of it, — The Mogul Tartars succeeded as the 
guilty possessors and cruel desolators of the land of 
Babylon. " Bagdad, after a siege of two months, was 
stormed and sacked by the Moguls, under Holagou 
Khan, the grandson of Ghengis Khan."*][ And Tamer- 
lane, another great king, " reduced to his obedience the 
whole course of the Tigris and Euphrates, from the 
mouth to the sources of these rivers : and he erected on 
the ruins of Bagdad a pyramid of ninety thousand 
heads."** Finally, not with abated, but if possible with 
increasing or with more persevering cruelty, the Turks, 
aided by Saracens, Coords, and Tartars, have become 
the weapons of the indignation of the Lord, brought forth 

* Gibbon, vol. ii. c. xxiv. p. 374 f Ibid. p. 3G1. 

I Ibid. vol. iv. c. xlvi. p. 441 $ Ibid. vol. v. c. Ii. p. 338. 

[| Ibid. vol. vi. c. Ixiv. p. 278. if Ibid. ** Ibid. c. lxv. p. 312, 322. 



BABYLON. 207 

out of his armory which he hath opened ; for — fearful as a 
token of judgment, and clear as the testimony of truth 
— this is the work of the Lord God of Hosts in the land of 
the Chaldeans. — Waste and utterly destroy after them. A 
*word is upon the Chaldeans. A sound of battle is in the 
land, and of great destruction. I will kindle a fire in 
his cities, and it shall devour all round about him. ^4. 
sound of great destruction corneth from the land of the 
Chaldeans. 

And Chaldea shall he a spoil : all that spoil her shall be 
satisfied, saith the Lord. Come against her from the utmost 
border, open her storehouses. A sword is upon her treasures, 
and they shall be robbed. O thou that dwellest upon many 
waters, abundant in treasures, thine end is come, and the 
measure of thy covetousness. On taking Babylon sud- 
denly and by surprise, Cyrus became immediately pos- 
sessed of the treasures of darkness, and hidden riches of 
secret places. On his first publicly appearing in Babylon, 
all the officers of his army, both of the Persians and 
allies, according to his command, wore very splendid 
robes, those belonging to the superior officers being of 
various colours, all of the finest and brightest die, and 
richly embroidered with gold and silver; and thus the 
hidden riches of secret places were openly displayed. And 
when the treasures of Babylon became the spoil of an- 
other great king, Alexander gave six mince (about 15/.) 
to each Macedonian horseman, to each Macedonian sol- 
dier and foreign horseman two minae (5/.), and to every 
other man in his army a donation equal to two months' 
pay. Demetrius ordered his soldiers to plunder the land 
of Babylon for their own use:* — But it is not in these in- 
stances alone that Chaldea has been a spoil, and that all 
who spoil her have been satisfied. It was the abundance 
of her treasures which brought successive spoliators. 
Many nations came from afar, and though they returned 
to their own country (as in formerly besieging Babylon, 
so in continuing to despoil the land of Chaldea), none re- 
turned in vain. From the richness of the country, new 
treasures were speedily stored up, till again the sword 
came upon them, and they were robbed. The prey of the 
Persians and of the Greeks for nearly two centuries after 
the death of Alexander, Chaldea became afterward the 
prey chiefly of the Parthians, from the north, for an equal 

* Flutarch. Life of Demetrius, 



208 BABYLON. 

period, till a greater nation, the Romans, came from the 
coasts of the earth to pillage it. To be restrained from 
dominion and from plunder was the exciting cause, and 
often the shameless plea, of the anger and fierce wrath 
of these famed, but cruel, conquerors of the world. 
Yet, within the provinces of their empire, it was their 
practice, on the submission of the inhabitants, to protect 
and not to destroy. But Chaldea, from its extreme dis- 
tance, never having yielded permanently to their yoke, 
and the limits of their empire having been fixed by Ha- 
drian on the western side of the Euphrates, or on the 
very borders of Chaldea, that hapless country obtained 
not their protection, though repeatedly the scene of 
ruthless spoliation by the Romans. The authority of 
Gibbon, in elucidation of Scripture, cannot be here dis- 
trusted, any more than that of heathen historians. To 
use his words, " a hundred thousand captives, and a rich 
booty, rewarded the fatigues of the Roman soldiers,"* 
when Ctesiphon was taken, in the second century, by 
the generals of Marcus. Even Julian, who, in the fourth 
century, was forced to raise the siege of Ctesiphon, 
came not in vain to Chaldea, and failed not to take of it 
a spoil ; nor, though an apostate, did he fail to verify by 
his acts the truth which he denied. After having given 
Perisabor to the flames, " the plentiful magazines of 
corn, of arms, and of splendid furniture were partly 
distributed among the troops, and partly reserved for the 
public service ; the useless stores were destroyed by fire, 
or thrown into the stream of the Euphrates."! Having 
also rewarded his army with a hundred pieces of silver 
to each soldier, he thus stimulated them (when still dis- 
satisfied) to fight for greater spoil — " Riches are the ob- 
ject of your desires 1 those riches are in the hands of 
the Persians, and the spoils of this fruitful country are 
proposed as the prize of your valour and discipline. "J 
The enemy being defeated after an arduous conflict, tk the 
spoil was such as might be expected from the riches and 
luxury of an oriental camp ; large quantities of silver and 
gold, splendid arms and trappings, and beds and tables 
of massy silver."^ 

When the Romans under Heraclius ravaged Chaldea, 
" though much of the treasure had been removed from 
Destagered, &nd much had been expended, the remaining 

* Gibbon, vol. i. c. viii o. 211. t Ibid. vol. ii. c. xxiv. p 361. 

t Ibid. p. 364. $ Ibid. p. 369. 



BABYLON. 209 

wealth appears to aave exceeded their hopes, and even to 
have satiated their avarice."* 

While the deeds of Julian and the words of Gibbon 
show how Chaldea was spoiled — how a sword continued 
to be on her treasures — and how, year after year, and age 
after age, there was rumour on rumour and violence in her 
land — more full illustrations remain to be given of the 
truth of the same prophetic word. And as a painter of 
great power may cope with another by drawing as 
closely to the life as he, though the features be different, 
so Gibbon's description of the sack of Ctesiphon, as pre- 
viously he had described the sack and conflagration of 
Seleucia (cities each of which may aptly be called " the 
daughter of Babylon," having been, like it, the capital 
of Chaldea), is written as if, by the most graphic 
representation of facts, he had been aspiring to rival 
Volney as an illustrator of Scripture prophecy. " The 
capital was taken by assault ; and the disorderly re- 
sistance of the people gave a keener edge to the sabres 
of the Moslems, who shouted with religious transport, 
\ This is the white palace of Chosroes ; this is the 
promise of the apostle of God.' The naked robbers of 
the desert were suddenly enriched beyond the measure 
of their hope or knowledge. Each chamber revealed a 
new treasure, secreted with art, or ostentatiously dis- 
played ; the gold and silver, the various wardrobes and 
precious furniture, surpassed (says Abulfeda) the esti- 
mate of fancy or numbers ; and another historian defines 
the untold and almost infinite mass by the fabulous com- 
putation of three thousands of thousands of thousands 
of pieces of gold. One of the apartments of the palace 
was decorated with a carpet of silk sixty cubits in length 
and as many in breadth (90 feet) ; a paradise, or garden, 
was depicted on the ground; the flowers, fruits, and 
shrubs were imitated by the figures of the gold embroi- 
dery, and the colours of the precious stones : and the ample 
square was encircled by a variegated and verdant border. 
The rigid Omar divided the prize among his brethren of 
Medina ; the picture was destroyed ; but such was the 
intrinsic value of the materials, that the share of Ali 
alone was sold for 20,000 drachms. A mule that carried 
away the tiara and cuirass, the belt and bracelets of 
Chosroes, was overtaken by the pursuers ; the gorgeous 

* Gibbon, p. 359. 
18* 



210 BABYLON. 

trophy was presented to the commander of the faithful, 
and the gravest of the companions condescended to smile 
when they beheld the white beard, hairy arms, and un- 
couth figure of the veteran who was invested with the 
spoil of the great king."* 

Recent evidence is not wanting to show that, wherever 
a treasure is to be found, a sword, in the hand of a fierce 
enemy, is upon it, and spoliation has not ceased in the 
land of Chaldea. 

" On the west of Hilleh, there are two towns which, 
in the eyes of the Persians and all the Shiites, are ren- 
dered sacred by the memory of two of the greatest mar- 
tyrs of that sect. These are Meshed Ali and Meshed 
Housein, lately filled with riches, accumulated by the 
devotion of the Persians, but carried off by the ferocious 
Wahabees to the middle of their deserts."! 

And after the incessant spoliation of ages, now that 
the end is come of the treasures of Chaldea, the earth 
itself fails not to disclose its hidden treasures, so as to 
testify that they once were abundant. In proof of this 
an instance may be given. At the ruins of Hoomania, 
near to those of Ctesiphon, pieces of silver having (on 
the 5th of March, 1812) been accidentally discovered, 
edging out of the bank of the Tigris, " on examination 
there were found and brought away," by persons sent for 
that purpose by the Pasha of Bagdad's officers, " between 
six and seven hundred ingots of silver, each measuring 
from one to one and a half feet in length ; and an earthen 
jar, containing upwards of two thousand Athenian coins, 
all of silver. Many were purchased at the time by the 
late Mr. Rich, formerly the East India Company's resi- 
dent at Bagdad, and are now in his valuable collection, 
since bought by government, and deposited in the Brit- 
ish Museum."{ Amid the ruins of Ctesiphon " the na- 
tives often pick up coins of gold, silver, and copper, for 
which they always find a ready sale in Bagdad. Indeed, 
some of the wealthy Turks and Armenians, who are 
collecting for several French and German consuls, hire 
people to go and search for coins, medals, and antique 
gems ; and I am assured they never return to their em- 
ployers empty-handed,"^ as if all who spoil Chaldea shall 

* Gibbon, c.li. p. 111,451. 

t Malte Brim's Geog. vol. if. p. 119. Buckingham's Travels in Mesopota 
mia, vol. ii. p. 246. 
X Captain Mignan's Travels, p. 53. $ Ibid. p. 74. 



BABYLON. 211 

be satisfied, till even the ruins be spoiled unto the utter- 
most. 

The past history of the land of the Chaldeans may 
be briefly closed in the language of prophecy : for the 
prophets, in their visions, saw it as it is ; although his- 
torians knew not, even after its grandeur was partially 
gone, how to tell of its fertility, which they witnessed, 
and hope to be believed. Those who recorded the word 
that the Lord spake against Babylon and against the land 
of the Chaldeans, had no such fear, though two thousand 
four hundred years have elapsed since they described 
what is now only at last to be seen. 

i" luill punish the land of the Chaldeans, and will make it 
perpetual desolations ; cut off the sower from Babylon, and 
him that handleth the sickle in the time of harvest, A 
drought is on her waters, and they shall be dried up. Be- 
hold the hindermost of the nations, a dry land and a desert. 
Her cities are a desolation, a dry land and a loilderness, a 
land where no man divelleth, neither doeth son of man pass 
thereby. I will send unto Babylon fanners, that shall fan 
her, and empty her land. The land shall tremble and sor- 
row ; for every purpose of the Lord shall be performed 
against Babylon, to make the land of Babylon a desolation 
without an inhabitant. The land of the Chaldeans was 
to be made perpetual or long-continued desolation. — Rav- 
aged and spoiled for ages, the Chaldees' excellence 
finally disappeared, and the land became desolate, as 
still it remains. RauwolfF, who passed through it in 1574, 
describes the country as bare, and " so dry and barren 
that it cannot be tilled."* And the most recent travel- 
lers all concur in describing it in similar terms. 

The land of Babylon was to be fanned and emptied, — to 
be a dry land, a wilderness and a desert, &c. — On the one 
side, near to the site of Opis, " the country all around 
appears to be one wide desert, of sandy and barren soil, 
thinly scattered over with brushwood and tufts of reedy 
grass."! On the other, bet we in Bussorah and Bagdad, 
* immediately on either bank of the Tigris, is the un- 
trodden desert. The absence of all cultivation, — the 
sterile, arid, and wild character of the whole scene, 
formed a contrast to the rich and delightful accounts 
delineated in Scripture. The natives, in travelling over 
these pathless deserts, are compelled to explore their 

* RauwoIfPs Travels, in Ray's Collection of Travels, 1693, p. 174. 
t Buckingham's Travels in Mesopotamia, voL ii. p. 155.. 



212 BABYLON. 

way by the stars."* " The face of the country is open 
and flat, presenting to the eye one vast level plain, 
where nothing is to be seen but here and there a herd 
of half-wild camels. This immense tract is very rarely 
diversified with any trees of moderate growth, but is an 
immense wild bounded only by the horizon."! In the 
intermediate region, " the whole extent from the foot of 
the wall of Bagdad is a barren waste without a blade 
of vegetation of any description ; on leaving the gates 
the traveller has before him the prospect of a bare 
desert, — a flat and barren country."^ " The whole coun- 
try between Bagdad and Hillah is a perfectly flat and 
(with the exception of a few spots as you approach the 
latter place) uncultivated waste. That it was at some 
former period in a far different state, is evident from the 
number of canals by which it is traversed, now dry and 
neglected ; and the quantity of heaps of earth covered 
with fragments of brick and broken tiles, which are seen 
in every direction, — the indisputable traces of former 
population. At present the only inhabitants of the tract 
are the Sobeide Arabs. Around, as far as the eye can 
reach is a trackless desert."^ " The abundance of the 
country has vanished as clean away as if the ' besom of 
desolation' had swept it from north to south ; the whole 
land from the outskirts of Babylon to the farthest stretch 
of sight lying a melancholy waste. Not a habitable spot 
appears for countless miles."|| The land of Babylon is 
desolate without an inhabitant. The Arabs traverse it ; 
and ever}^ man met with in the desert is looked on as an 
enemy. Wild beasts have now their home in the land 
of Chaldea; but the traveller is less afraid of them, — 
even of the lion, — than of " the wilder animal the desert 
Arab." The country is frequently " totally impassable." 
" Those splendid accounts of the Babylonian lands yield- 
ing crops of grain two or three hundred-fold, compared 
with the modern face of the country, afford a remarkable 
proof of the singular desolation to which it has been sub- 
jected. The canals at present can only be traced by 
their decayed banks."^" 

* Mignan's Travels, p. 5. 

f Ibid. p. 31, 32. Keppel's Nar. vol. i. p. 260. Buckingham's Travels, p. 242. 
Kinrjier's Memoirs of Persia, p. 279. 

X Rich's Memoir, p. 4. § Keppel's Nar. p. 87. 

I! Sir R. K. Porter's Travels in Babylonia, &c. vol. ii. p. 285. 

W Mignan's Travels, p. 2. 

** Transactions of the Literary Society, Bombay, vol. i. p. 123, 138. Caj> 
tain Frederick on the State of Babylon. 



BABYLON. 213 

" The soil of this desert," says Captain Mignan, who 
traversed it on foot, and who, in a single day, crossed 
forty water-courses, " consists of a hard clay, mixed 
with sand, which at noon became so heated with the 
sun's rays that I found it too hot to walk over it with 
any degree of comfort. Those who have crossed those 
desert wilds are already acquainted with their dreary 
tediousness even on horseback ; what it is on foot they 
can easily imagine."* 

Where astronomers first calculated eclipses, the na- 
tives, as in the deserts of Africa, or as the mariner with- 
out a compass on the pathless ocean, can now direct 
their course only by the stars, over the pathless desert 
of Chaldea. Where cultivation reached its utmost height, 
and where two hundred-fold was stated as the common 
produce, there is now one wide and uncultivated waste ; 
and the sower and reaper are cut off from the land of Baby- 
lon. Where abundant stores and treasures were laid up, 
and annually renewed and increased, fanners have fanned, 
and spoilers have spoiled them till they have emptied the 
land. Where labourers, shaded by palm-trees a hundred 
feet high, irrigated the fields till all was plentifully 
watered from numerous canals, the wanderer, without 
an object on which to fix his eye, but "stinted and 
shortlived shrubs," can scarcely set his foot without 
pain, after the noon-day heat, on the " arid and parched 
ground," in plodding his weary way through a desert, a 
dry land, and a wilderness. Where there were crowded 
thoroughfares, from city to city, there is now " silence 
and solitude ;" for the ancient cities of Chaldea are deso- 
lations,— where no man dwelleth, neither doth any son of 
man pass thereby. ,f 

* Mignan's Travels, p. 2, 31-34. 

t Sin has wrought desolation in Chaldea, as finally, if unrepented of, it 
must in any and in every land. But justice shall yet dwell in the wilderness, 
and righteousness remain in the fruitful field. And, not in Judea alone, on 
the restoration and conversion of all the house of Israel, but throughout all 
* nations, when enlightened by the word of God, and renewed by his Spirit, 
moved by whom the prophets spake — the work of righteousness shall be 
peace ; and the effect of righteousness, quietness, and assurance for ever 
(Isa. xxxii. 15-17); and it is pleasing to pause for a moment, and to turn 
from the direful retrospect of sin, judgment, and desolation, which the past 
history of Chaldea holds up to view, to a word of Scripture (one word, if 
rightly interpreted, is enough), which, like a bright star in the east, shines as 
the harbinger of a brighter day, after the long night of darkness which has 
rested on that land which was full of wickedness, and therefore has been 
emptied in judgment. And seemingly commencing convulsions, in the war 
and the trial of principles, throughout the wide world, that must come, — the 
rising " hurricane" which, controlled by the Lord, shall yet sweep every moral 



214 BABYLON. 

Her cities are desolations. The course of the Tigris 
through Babylonia, instead of being adorned, as of old, 
with cities, and towns, is marked with the sites of 
" ancient ruins."* Sitace, Sabata, Narisa, Fuchera. Sen- 
dia "no longer exist."f A succession of longitudinal 
mounds, crossed at right angles by others, mark the 
supposed site of Artemita, or Destagered. Its once 
luxuriant gardens are covered with grass ; and a higher 
mound distinguishes " the royal residence" from the 
ancient streets.} " Extensive ridges and mounds (near 
to Houmania), varying in height and extent, are seen 
branching in every direction."^ A wall, with sixteen 
bastions, is the only memorial of Apollonia.|| The 
once magnificent Seleucia is now a scene of desolation. 
There is not a single entire building, but the country is 
strewed for miles with fragments of decayed buildings. 
"As far," says Major Keppel, " as the eye could reach, 
the horizon presented a broken line of mounds ; the 
whole of this place was a desert flat."Tf On the opposite 
bank of the Tigris, where Ctesiphon its rival stood, 
besides fragments of walls and broken masses of brick- 
work, and remains of vast structures encumbered with 
heaps of earth, there is one magnificent monument of 
antiquity, " in a remarkably perfect state of preserva- 
tion," " a large and noble file of building, the front of 
which presents to view a wall three hundred feet in 
length, adorned with four rows of arched recesses, with 
a central arch, in span eighty-six feet, and above a hun- 
dred feet high, supported by walls sixteen feet thick, 
and leading to a hall which extends to the depth of one 
hundred and fifty-six feet," the width of the building.** 

"pestilence" from the earth, — seem in their beginning to betoken, that the 
time may not be distant when the effect of the vision shall be seen. Then 
said I to the angel that talked with me (Zechariah, v. 10, 11), Whither do 
these bear the ephah ? And he said unto me, To build it an house in the 
land of Shinar ; and it. shall be established, and set there on its own base, — in 
the land of Shinar, but it is not said, in the city of Babylon. Building, estab- 
lishing, and setting, all appear to be significative of blessing— of reconstruc- 
tion, on a new base, and not reducible to heaps ; and though the previous 
vision be of judgment, he whose name is the branch is immediately after 
spoken of; and, in " building the temple of the Lord," his office is redemption. 
But, without a metaphor, it is said, and, without a doubt, it shall prove true — 
All the ends of the earth shall see the salvation of the Lord. The whole 
earth shall rejoice, — the ivilderness and the solitary places shall be glad for 
them ; and the desert shall rejoice, and blossom as the rose. 

* See Chart prefixed to Major Keppel's Narrative. 

t Plan of the Environs of Babylon, &c in Major Rennell's Geography of 
Herodotus, p. 335. 

t Keppel's Narrative, vol. i. p. 267 $ Mignan's Travels, p. 49. 

J] Keppel's Narrative, p. 276. 11 Ibid. p. 125. * _ ** Ibid, p 130 



BABYLON. 215 

A great part of the back wall, and of the ioof, is broken 
down ; but that which remains " still appears much 
larger than Westminster Abbey."* It is supposed to 
have been the lofty palace of Chosroes ; but there deso- 
lation now reigns. " On the site of Ctesiphon, the 
smallest insect under heaven would not find a single 
blade of grass wherein to hide itself, nor one drop of 
water to allay its thirst."! In the rear of the palace, 
and attached to it, are mounds two miles in circumfe- 
rence, indicating the utter desolation of buildings formed 
to minister to luxury. But, in the words of Captain Mig- 
nan, " such is the extent of the irregular mounds and 
hillocks that overspread the sites of these renowned 
cities, that it would occupy some months to take the 
bearings and dimensions of each with accuracy."! 

While the ancient cities of Chaldea are thus desolate, the 
sites of others cannot be discovered, or have not been 
visited, as none pass thereby ; the more modern cities, 
which flourished under the empire of califs, are "all in 
ruins. "§ The second Bagdad has not indeed yet shared 
the fate of the first. And Hillah — a town of compara- 
tively modern date, near to the site of Babylon, but in 
th.3 gardens of which there is not the least vestige of 
ruins — yet exists. But the former, " ransacked by mas- 
sacre, devastation, and oppression, during several hun- 
dred years," has been " gradually reduced from being a 
rich and powerful city to a state of comparative poverty, 
and the feeblest means of defence." || And of the in- 
habitants of the latter, about eight or ten thousand, it is 
said that " if any thing could identify the modern inhab- 
itants of Hillah as the descendants of the ancient Baby- 
lonians, it would be their extreme profligacy, for which 
they are notorious even among their immoral neigh- 
bours."^" They give no sign of repentance and reforma- 
tion to warrant the hope that judgment, so long con- 
tinued upon others, will cease from them ; or that they 
are the people that shall escape. Twenty years have 
not passed since towns in Chaldea have been ravaged 
and pillaged by the Wahabees ; and so lately as 1823, the 
town of Sheereban "was sacked and ruined by the 
Coords," and reduced to desolation.** Indications of 

* Mignan's Travels, p. 79. t Buck. p. 441. 

X Mignan's Travels, p. 81. $ Ibid. p. 82. 

|| Sir R. K. Porter's Travels, vol. ii. p. 265, 266. 

If KeDpel's Narrative, vol. i p. 182.183. ** Ibid. p. 272, 278 



210 BABYLON. 

ruined cities, whether of a remote or more recent period, 
abound throughout the land. The process of destruc- 
tion is still completing. Gardens which studded the banks 
of the Tigris have very recently disappeared, and mingled 
with the desert, — and concerning the cities also of Chal- 
dea the word is true that they are desolations. For 
" the whole country is strewed over with the debris of 
Grecian, Roman, and Arabian towns, confounded in the 
same mass of rubbish."* 

But while these lie in indiscriminate ruins, the chief 
of the cities of Chaldea, the first in name and in power 
that ever existed in the world, bears many a defined mark 
of the judgments of heaven. 

The progressive and predicted decline of Babylon the 
great, till it ceased to be a city, has already been briefly 
detailed. About the beginning of the Christian era, a 
small portion of it was inhabited, and the far greater part 
was cultivated.! It diminished as Seleucia increased, 
and the latter became the greater city. In the second 
century nothing but the walls remained. It became grad- 
ually a great desert ; and,. in the fourth century, its walls, 
repaired for that purpose, formed an enclosure for wild 
beasts, and Babylon was converted into a field for the 
chase — a hunting-place for the pastime of the Persian 
monarchs. The name and the remnant were cut off from 
Babylon; and there is a blank, during the interval of 
many ages, in the history of its mutilated remains and 
of its mouldering decay. It remained long in the pos- 
session of the Saracens ; and abundant evidence has since 
been given, that every feature of its prophesied desola- 
tion is now distinctly visible — for the most ancient his- 
torians bore not a clearer testimony to facts confirmatory 
of the prophecies relative to its first siege and capture by 
Cyras, than the latest travellers bear to the fulfilment of 
those which refer to its final and permanent ruin. The 
identity of its site has been completely established. J And 
the truth of every general and of every particular predic- 
tion is now so clearly demonstrated, that a simple exhibi- 
tion of the facts precludes the possibility of any cavil, and 
supersedes the necessity of any reasoning on the subject. 

It is not merely the general desolation of Babylon, — 
however much that alone would have surpassed all human 
foresight, — which the Lord diSlared by the mouth of 

* Malte Brun's Geography, vol. ii. p. 119. t i>iod. Sic. torn. ii. p. 35, 

X ttennelPs Geography of Herodotus, p. 349. Keppel's Narrative, p 171. 



BABYLON. 217 

his prophets. In their vision, they saw not more clearly, 
nor defined more precisely, the future history of Babylon, 
from the height of its glory to the oblivion of its name, 
than they saw and depicted fallen Babylon as now it lies, 
and as, in the nineteenth century of the Christian era, it 
has, for the first time, been fully described.* And now 
when an end has come upon Babylon, after a long succes- 
sion of ages has wrought out its utter desolation, both 
the pen and the pencil of travellers, who have traversed 
and inspected its ruins, must be combined, in order to de- 
lineate what the word of God, by the prophets, told from 
the beginning that that end would be. 

Truth ever scorns the discordant and encumbering aid 
of error : but to diverge in the least from the most pre- 
cise facts would here weaken and destroy the argument ; 
for the predictions correspond not closely with any thing, 
except alone with the express and literal reality. To 
swerve from it, is, in the same degree, to vary from them : 
and any misrepresentation would be no less hurtful than 
iniquitous. But the actual fact renders any exaggeration 
impossible, and any fiction poor. Fancy could not have 
feigned a contrast more complete, nor a destruction 
greater, than that which has come from the Almighty upon 
Babylon. And though the greatest city on which the sun 
ever shone be now a desolate ivilderness, there is scarcely 
any spot on earth more clearly defined — and none could 
be more accurately delineated by the hands of a drafts- 
man — than the scene of Babylon's desolation is set before 
us in the very words of the prophets ; and no words could 
now be chosen like unto these, which, for two thousand 
five hundred years have been its " burden" — the burden 
which now it bears. 

Such is the multiplicity of prophecies and the accu- 
mulation of facts, that the very abundance of evidence 
increases the difficulty of arranging, in a condensed form, 
and thus appropriating its specific fulfilment to each pre- 
cise and separate prediction, and many of them may be 
viewed connectedly. All who have visited Babylon con- 
cur in acknowledging or testifying that the desolation is 
exactly such as was foretold. They, in general, apply 
the more prominent predictions ; and, in minute details, 

* Niebuhr, Ives, Irwin, Ottar, Evirs, Thevenot, Delia Valle, Texeira, Edrisi, 
Abulieda, and Balbi were consulted by Major Rennell— to these may now be 
added Mr. Rich, Sir Robert Ker Porter, Captain Frederick, the Hon. Major 
Kej.j tl, Colonel Kinnier, Mr. Buckingham, and Captain Mignan,— most of 
whom were accompanied by others. 

19 K 



218 BABYLON. 

they sometimes unconsciously adopt, without any a'Au- 
sion or reference, the very words, of inspiration. 

Babylon is wholly desolate. It has become heaps — it 
is cut down to the ground — brought down to the grave — 
trodden on — uninhabited — its foundations fallen — its walls 
thrown down, and utterly broken — its loftiest edifices 
rolled down from the rocks — the golden city has ceased 
—the worms are spread under it, and the worms cover 
it, &3. There the Arabian pitches not his tent; there 
the shepherds make not their folds ; but wild beasts of 
the desert lie there, and their houses are full of doleful 
creatures, and owls dwell there, &c. It is a. possession 
for the bittern, and a dwelling-place for dragons — a wil- 
derness, a dry land, and a desert — a burnt mountain — 
pools of water — spoiled — empty — nothing left — utterly 
destroyed — every one that goeth by it is astonished, &c. 

Babylon shall become heaps, Babylon, the glory of 
kingdoms, is now the greatest of ruins. " Immense tu- 
muli of temples, palaces, and human habitations of every 
description" are everywhere seen, and form " long and 
varied lines of ruins," which, in some places, " rather 
resemble natural hills than mounds which cover the re- 
mains of great and splendid edifices."* — Those buildings 
which were once the iaoour of slaves and the pride of 
kings, are now misshapen heaps of rubbish. — "The 
whole face of the country is covered with vestiges of 
building, in some places consisting of brick walls sur- 
prisingly fresh, in others, merely a vast succession of 
mounds of rubbish, of such indeterminate figures, variety 
and extent as to involve the person who should have 
formed any theory in inextricable confusion."! " Long* 
mounds, running from north to south, are crossed by 
others from east to west ;" and are only distinguished by 
their form, direction, and number from the decayed banks 
of canals. " The greater part of the mounds are cer- 
tainly the remains of buildings, originally disposed in 
streets, and crossing each other at right angh s."{ The 
more distinct and prominent of these " heaps" are double, 
or lie in parallel lines, each exceeding twenty feet in 
height, and " are intersected by cross passages, in such 
a manner as to place beyond a doubt the fact of their 
being rows of houses or streets fallen to decay."§ Such 
was the form of the streets of Babylon, leading towards 

* Porter's Travels, vol. ii. p. 294, 297. f Rich's Memoirs, p. 2. 

t Buckingham's Travels in Mesopotamia, vol. ii. p. 298. $ Ibid. p. 299 



BABYLON. 219 

the gates : and such are now the lines of its heaps-— 
" There are also, in some places, two hollow channels, 
and three mounds, running parallel to each other for a 
considerable distance, the central mound being, in such 
cases, a broader and flatter mass than the other two, as 
if there had been two streets going parallel to each other f 
the central range of houses which divided them being 
twice the size of the others, from their being double resi- 
dences, with a front and door of entrance to face each 
avenue. "* " Irregular hillocks and mounds, formed over 
masses of ruins, present at every step memorials of the 
past."f 

From the temple of Belus and the two royal palaces, 
to the streets of the city and single dwellings, all have 
become heaps ; and the only difference or gradation now 
is, from the vast and solid masses of ruins which look 
like mountains, to the slight mound that is scarcely ele- 
vated above the plain. Babylon is fallen, literally fallen 
to such a degree that those who stand on its site and 
look on numerous parallel mounds, with a hollow space 
between, are sometimes at a loss to distinguish between 
the remains of a street or a canal, or to tell where the 
crowds frequented or where the waters flowed. Babylon 
is fallen, till its ruins cannot fall lower than they lie. It 
is cut down to the ground. Her foundations are fallen ; 
and the ruins rest not on them. Its palaces, temples, 
streets, and houses lie " buried in shapeless heaps."f 
And " the view of Babylon," as taken from the spot, is 
truly a picture of utter desolation, presenting its heaps to 
the eye, and showing how, as if literally buried under 
them, Babylon is brought down to the grave. 

Cast her up as heaps. Mr. Rich, in describing a grand 
heap of ruins, the shape of which is nearly a square of 
seven hundred yards length and breadth, states that the 
workmen pierce into it in every direction, in search of 
bricks, " hollowing out deep ravines and pits, and throw- 
ing up the rubbish in heaps on the surface."^ " The 
summit of the Kasr" (supposed to have been the lesser 
palace) is in like manner " covered with heaps of rubbish" 

Let nothing of her be left. " Vast heaps constitute all 
that now remains of ancient Babylon. "|| All its grandeur 
is departed; all its treasures have been spoiled; all its 

* Buckingham's Travels in Mesopotamia, vol. ii. p. 299. 

t Mignan's Travels, vol. ii. p. 116. X Barter's Travels, p. 294. 

% Rich's Memoir, p. 22- 11 Keppel's Narrative, p. 196 

K2 



220 BABYLON. 

excellence has utterly vanished ; the very heaps are 
searched for bricks, when nothing else can be found ; 
even these are not left wherever they can be taken away, 
and Babylon has for ages been " a quarry above ground," 
ready to the hand of every successive despoiler. With- 
out the most remote allusion to this prophecy, Captain 
Mignan describes a mound attached to the palace ninety 
yards in breadth by half that height, the whole of which 
is deeply furrowed, in the same manner as the generality 
of the mounds. " The ground is extremely soft, and 
tiresome to walk over, and appears completely exhausted 
of all its building materials : nothing now is left save one 
towering hill, the earth of which is mixed with. fragme?its 
of broken brick, red varnished pottery, tile, bitumen, 
mortar, glass, shells, and pieces of mother-of-pearl,"* — 
worthless fragments, of no value to the poorest. From 
thence shall she be taken — let nothing of her be left. One 
traveller, towards the end of last century, passed over 
the site of ancient Babylon, without being conscious of 
having traversed it.f 

While the workmen cast her up as heaps in piling up 
the rubbish while excavating for brick, that they may 
take them from thence, and that nothing may be left ; they 
labour more than trebly in the fulfilment of prophecy, 
for the numerous and deep excavations form pools of 
water, on the overflowing of the Euphrates, and, annu- 
ally filled, they are not dried up throughout the year. 
" Deep cavities are also formed by the Arabs, when 
digging for hidden treasure. "J " The ground is some- 
times covered with, pools of water in the hollows."^ 

Sit on the dust, sit on the ground, O daughter of the Chal- 
deans. The surface of the mounds, which form all that 
remains of Babylon, consists of decomposed buildings 
reduced to dust; and over all the ancient streets and 
habitations there is literally nothing but the dust or the 
ground on which to sit. 

Thy nakedness shall be uncovered. " Our path," says 
Captain Mignan, " lay through the great mass of ruined 
heaps on the site of ' shrunken Babylon.' And I am 
perfectly incapable of conveying an adequate idea of 
the dreary, lonely nakedness that appeared before me."|| 

* Mignan's Travels, p. 199, 200. 

t Transactions of the Literary Society at Bombay, vol. i. p. 130 Note Cun- 
ningham's Joupney to India, 1785. 
X Mignan's Travels, p. 213. 

§ Buckingham's Travels, vol. ii. p. 296. KeppePs Travels, vol. i p. 125. 
jj Mignan's Travels, p. 116. 



BABYLON. 221 

Sit thou silent, and get thee into darkness. There reigns 
throughout the ruins " a silence profound as the grave. 5 '* 
Babylon is now " a silent scene, a sublime solitude."! 

It shall never be inhabited, nor dwelt in from generation to 
generation* From Rauwolff's testimony it appears that 
in the sixteenth century " there was not a house to be 
seen."J And now the " eye wanders over a barren desert, 
in which the ruins are nearly the only indication that it 
had ever been inhabited." " It is impossible," adds Ma- 
jor Keppel, " to behold this scene and not to be reminded 
how exactly the predictions of Isaiah and Jeremiah have 
been fulfillec 1 , even in the appearance Babylon was doomed 
to present, that she should never be inhabited ; that ' the 
Arabian should not pitch his tent there ;' that she should 
' become heaps ;' that her cities should be ' a desolation, 
a dry land, and a wilderness.' "$ " Babylon is spurned 
alike by the heel of the Ottomans, the Israelites, and the 
sons of Ishmael."|| It is " a tenantless and desolate me- 
tropolis."^" It shall not be inhabited, but be wholly desolate, 

Neither shall the Arabian pitch tent there, neither shall 
the shepherds make their folds there. It was prophesied 
of Ammon that it should be a stable for camels and a 
couching-place for flocks; and of Philistia, that it should 
be cottages for shepherds, and a pasture of flocks. But 
Babylon was to be visited with a far greater desolation, 
and to become unfit or unsuiting even for such a purpose. 
And that neither a tent would be pitched there, even by 
an Arab, nor a fold made by a shepherd, implies the last 
degree of solitude and desolation. "It is common in 
these parts for shepherds to make use of ruined edifices 
to shelter their flocks in."** But Babylon is an excep- 
tion. Instead of taking the bricks from thence, the shep- 
herd might with facility erect a defence from wild 
beasts, and make a fold for his flock amid the heaps of 
Babylon ; and the Arab, who fearlessly traverses it by 
day, might pitch his tent by night. But neither the one 
nor the other could now be persuaded to remain a single 
night among the ruins. The superstitious dread of evil 
spirits, far more than the natural terror of the wild 
beasts, effectually prevents them. Captain Mignan was 
accompanied by six Arabs, completely armed, but he 
" could not induce them to remain towards night, from 

* Porter's Travels, vol. ii. p. 294. t Ibid. p. 407. i Ibid. p. 174. 

$ Keppel's Narrative, * H. i. p. 197. || Mignau's Travels, p. 106. 
H" Ibid. p. 234. * * Ibid. p. 235 

19* 



222 BABYLON. 

the apprehension of evil spirits. It is impossible to 
eradicate this idea from the minds of these people, who 
are very deeply imbued with superstition." And when 
the sun sunk behind the Mujelibe, and the moon would 
have still lighted his way among the ruins, it was with 
infinite regret that he obeyed " the summons of his 
guides."* " All the people of the country assert that it is 
extremely dangerous to approach this mound after night- 
fall, on account of the multitude of evil spirits by which 
it is haunted."f Neither shall the Arabian pitch tent there ; 
neither shall the shepherds make their flock there. But, 

Wild beasts of the deserts shall lie there, and their houses 
shall be full of doleful creatures ; and owls shall dwell there, 
and satyrs (goats) shall dance there, &c. " There are 
many dens of wild beasts in various parts. There are 
quantities of porcupine quills (kephudl)." And while 
the lower excavations are often pools of water, " in most 
of the cavities are numbers of bats and owh"% "These 
souterrains (caverns), over which the chambers of ma- 
jesty may have been spread, are now the refuge of jack- 
als and other savage animals. The mouths of their 
entrances are strewed with the bones of sheep and 
goats ; and the loathsome smell that issues from most 
of them is sufficient warning not to proceed into the 
den."^ The king of the forest now ranges over the site 
of that Babylon which Nebuchadnezzar built for his 
own glory. And the temple of Beius, the greatest work 
of man, is now like unto a natural den of lions. " Two 
or three majestic lions" were seen upon its heights, by 
Sir Robert Ker Porter, as he was approaching it ; and 
" the broad prints of their feet were left plain in the 
clayey soil."|| Major Keppel saw there a similar foot- 
print of a lion. It is also the unmolested retreat of jack- 
als, hyenas, and other noxious animals. ^T Wild beasts are 
" numerous" at the Mujelibe, as well as on Birs Ni?nrood. 
"The mound was full of large holes ; we entered some 
of them, and found them strewed with the carcasses and 
skeletons of animals recently killed. The ordure of wild 
beasts was so strong that prudence got the better of 
curiosity, for we had no doubt as to the savage nature 
of the inhabitants. Our guides, indeed, told us that all 

* Travels, p. 201, 235. 

f Rich's Mem. p. 27. Buckingham's Travels, vol. ii. p. ZQ7. 

t Ibid. p. 30. <S Sir R. K. Porter's Travels, vol. ii. p. 3i2. 

j| Ibid. p. 387. IF Kinnier's Mem. p. 279. 



BABYLON. 223 

the ruins abounded in lions and other wild beasts ; so 
literally has the divine prediction been fulfilled, that wild 
beasts of the desert should lie there, and their houses be 
full of doleful creatures ; that the wild beasts of the 
island should cry in their desolate houses."* 

The sea is come upon Babylon. She is covered icith the 
multitude of the ivaves thereof. The traces of the western 
bank of the Euphrates are now no longer discernible. 
The river overflows unrestrained; and the very ruins, 
with " every appearance of the embankment," have been 
swept away. " The ground there is low and marshy, 
and presents not the slightest vestige of former build- 
ings, of any description whatever."! " Morasses and 
ponds tracked the ground in various parts. For a long 
time after the general subsiding of the Euphrates, great 
part of this plain is little better than a swamp, &c."J 
" The ruins of Babylon are then inundated, so as to 
render many parts of them inaccessible, by converting 
the valleys among them into morasses. "§ But while 
Babylon is thus covered with the multitude of ivaves, and 
the waters come upon it, yet, in striking contrast and 
seeming contradiction to such a feature of desolation 
(like the formation of pools of water from the casting up 
of heaps), at all times the elevated sun-burnt ruins, which 
the waters do not overflow, and generally throughout the 
year, the " dry waste" and " parched and burning plain,"|| 
on which the heaps of Babylon lie, equally prove that it 
is a desert, a dry land, and a wilderness. One part, even 
on the western side of the river, is " low and marshy, 
and another an arid desert. "^[ 

It shall never be inhabited. It shall be utterly desolate. 
" Ruins composed, like those of Babylon, of heaps of 
rubbish impregnated with nitre cannot be cultivated."** 
14 The decomposing materials of a Babylonian structure 
doom the earth on which they perish to lasting sterility. 
• — On this part of the plain, both where traces of buildings 
were left, and where none had stood, all seemed equally 
naked of vegetation ; the whole ground appearing as if it 
had been washed over and over again, by the coming 
and receding waters, till every bit of genial soil was 

* Keppel's Narrative, vol. i. p. 179, 180. 

t Buckingham's Travels, vol. ii. p. 278. 

% Sir R. K. Porter's Travels, vol. ii. p. 389, 390. 

^ Rich's Memoir, p. 13. 

[I Buckingham's Travels, vol. ii. p. 302, 305. 

TT Mignan's Travels, p. 139. Plan. ** Rich's Memoir, p. 16. 



224 BABYLON. 

x 

swept away ; its half-clay, half-sandy surface being left 
in ridgy streaks, like what is often seen on the flat 
shores of the sea, after the retreating of the tide."* 
Babylon, which in its pride did say, I shall be a lady for 
ever, is no more called the lady of kingdoms 5 but is deso- 
late for ever. 

Bel boiveth down. The temple of Belus, or Baal, here 
evidently spoken of, was a stadium, or furlong, in height 
computed by Major Rennell at five hundred, and by Pri- 
deaux at six hundred feet. By the lowest computation it 
was higher than the greatest of the pyramids. The 
highest of the heaps which now constitute fallen Baby- 
lon is the Birs Nimrood, generally supposed to have 
been the temple of Belus. The heap occupies a larger 
space of ground than that on which the temple stood, 
having spread, in falling down, beyond its original base. 
It rests not now upon its ancient foundations, but lies 
upon the earth an enormous mass of ruin. " At first 
sight it presents the appearance of a hill, with a castle 
at the top,"f so as not only to deceive the eye in behold- 
ing it at a distance, or in looking on its picture ; but, " in- 
credible as it may seem, the ruins on the summit of it 
are actually those spoken of by Pere Emanuel, who 
takes no sort of notice of the prodigious mound on which 
they are elevated. It is almost needless to observe, 
that the whole of the mound is itself a ruin ;"£ and it is 
altogether needless to add another word, to show that it 
is bowed down, as may be seen by the sketch of the 
comparative ancient and modern height annexed to the 
plan of Birs Nimrood, in Sir Robert K. Porter's Travels. § 

Bel is confounded. Originally constructed of eight 
successive towers, one rising above another, it is now 
consolidated into one irregular hill, presenting a different 
aspect, and of different altitudes on every side, — a con- 
fused and misshapen mass. " The eastern face pre- 
sents two stages of hill; the first showing an elevation 
of about sixty feet, cloven in the middle into a deep 
ravine, and intersected in all directions by furrows chan- 
nelled there by the descending rains of succeeding ages. 
The summit of this first stage stretches in rather a flat- 
tened sweep to the base of the second ascent, which 
springs out of the first in a steep and abrupt conical 

* Sir R. K. Porter's Travels, vol. ii. p. 392. 

t Mignan's Travels, p. 19*1. t Rich's Memoir, p. 37. 

$ Vol. ii. p. 323. 



BABYLON. 225 

torm, terminated on the top by a solitary standing frag- 
ment of brick-work, like the ruin of a tower. From the 
foundation of the whole pile to the base of this piece of 
ruin measures about two hundred feet ; and from the 
bottom of the ruin to its shattered top are thirty-five 
feet. On the western side, the entire mass rises at once 
from the plain in one stupendous, though irregular, 
pyramidal hill, broken in the slopes of its sweeping 
acclivities by the devastations of time, and rougher de- 
struction. The southern and northern fronts are par- 
ticularly abrupt."* Such, and so confounded, is now the 
temple of Belus. 

/ ivill stretch out mine hand upon thee, and roll thee 
down from the rocks, and will make thee a burnt mountain. 
On the summit of the hill are " immense fragments of 
brick-work of no determinate figures, tumbled together, 
and converted into solid vitrified masses."! " Some of 
these huge fragments measured twelve feet in height, 
by twenty-four in circumference ; and from the circum- 
stance of the standing brick-work having remained in a 
perfect state, the change exhibited in these is only ac- 
countable from their having been exposed to the fiercest 
fire, or rather scathed by lightning ."f " They are com- 
pletely molten — a strong presumption that fire was used 
in the destruction of the tower, which, in parts, resem- 
bles what the Scriptures prophesied it should become, 
4 a burnt mountain.' In the denunciation respecting 
Babylon, fire is particularly mentioned as an agent 
against it. To this Jeremiah evidently alludes, when he 
says that it should be ' as when God overthrew Sodom 
and Gomorrah,' on which cities, it is said, ' the Lord 
rained brimstone and fire.' — 'Her high gates shall be 
burned with fire, and the people shall labour in vain, and 
the folk in the fire, and they shall be weary.' "§ " In 
many of these immense unshapen masses might be 
traced the gradual effects of the consuming power, which 
had produced so remarkable an appearance ; exhibiting 
parts burnt to that variegated dark hue, seen in the vitri- 
fied matter lying about in glass manufactories ; while, 
through the whole of these awful testimonies of the fire 
(whatever fire it was !) which, doubtless, hurled them 
from their original elevation" (I ivill roll thee down from 

* SirR. K. Porter's Travels, vol. ii. p. 310. 

t Rich's Memoir, p. 36. X Mignan's Travels, p. 207 

Q Keppei's Narrative, p. 194, 1S5 

K 3 



226 BABYLON. 

the rocks), " the regular lines of the cement are visible, 
and so hardened in common with the bricks, that when 
the masses are struck they ring like glass. On examin- 
ing the base of the standing wall, contiguous to these 
huge transmuted substances, it is found tolerably free 
from any similar changes, in short, quite in its original 
state ; hence," continues Sir Robert Ker Porter, " I draw 
the conclusion, that the consuming power acted from 
above, and that the scattered ruin fell from some higher 
point than the summit of the present standing fragment. 
The heat of the fire which produced such amazing 
effects must have burned with the force of the strongest 
furnace ; and from the general appearance of the cleft 
in the wall, and these vitrified masses, I should be in- 
duced to attribute the catastrophe to lightning from 
heaven. Ruins by the explosion of any combustible 
matter would have exhibited very different appearances."* 

" The fallen masses bear evident proof of the opera- 
tion of fire having been continued on them, as well after 
they were broken down as before, since every part of 
their surface has been so equally exposed to it, that 
many of them have acquired a rounded form, and in 
none can the place of separation from its adjoining one 
be traced by any appearance of superior freshness, or 
any exemption from the influence of the destroying 
flame."! 

The high gates of the temple of Belus, which were 
standing in the time of Herodotus, have been burnt with 
fire ; the vitrified masses which fell when Bel bowed 
down rest on the top of its stupendous ruins. The hand 
of the Lord, has been stretched upon it; it has been rolled 
down from the rocks, and has been made a burnt mountain, 
— of which it was further prophesied, 

They shall not take of thee a stone for a corner, nor a 
stone for foundations, but thou shalt be desolate for ever, 
saith the Lord. The old wastes of Zion shall be built. ; 
its former desolations shall be raised up : and Jerusa- 
lem shall be inhabited again in her own place, even in 
Jerusalem. But it shall not be with Bel as with Zion, 
nor with Babylon as with Jerusalem. For as the " heaps 
of rubbish impregnated with nitre" which cover the site 
of Babylon "cannot be cultivated,"! so the vitrified 

* Sir R. K. Porter's Travels, vol. ii. p. 31fl,313 
t Buckingham's Travels, vol ii. p. 375. 
t Rich's Memoir, p. 16, 



EAEYLON. 227 

masses on the summit of Birs Nimrood cannot be re- 
built. Though still they be of the hardest substance, 
and indestructible by the elements, and though once 
they formed the highest pinnacles of Belus, yet, incapa- 
ble of being hewn into any regular form, they neither 
are nor can now be taken for a corner or for foundations. 
And the bricks on the solid fragments of wall, which 
rest on the summit, though neither scathed nor molten, 
are so firmly cemented, that, according to Mr. Rich, " it 
is nearly impossible to detach any of them whole,"* or, 
as Captain Mignan still more forcibly states, " they are 
so firmly cemented, that it is utterly impossible to de- 
tach any of them."f " My most violent attempts," says 
Sir Robert Ker Porter, " could not separate them. "J 
And Mr. Buckingham, in assigning reasons for lessening 
the wonder at the total disappearance of the walls at 
this distant period, and speaking of the Birs Nimrood 
generally, observes, "that the burnt bricks (the only 
ones sought after) which are found in the Mujelibe, the 
Kasr, and the Birs Nimrood, the only three great monu- 
ments in which there are any traces of their having been 
used, are so difficult, in the two last indeed so impossible, 
to be extracted whole, from the tenacity of the cement 
in which they are laid, that they could never have been 
resorted to while any considerable portion of the walls 
existed to furnish an easier supply : even now, though 
some portion of the mounds on the eastern bank of the 
river" (the Birs is on the western side) " are occasion- 
ally dug into for bricks, they are not extracted without 
a comparatively great expense, and very few of them 
whole, in proportion to the great number of fragments 
that come up with them."§ Around the tower there is not 
a single whole brick to be seen.|| 

These united testimonies, given without allusion to the 
prediction, afford a better than any conjectural com- 
mentary, such as previously was given without reference 
to these facts. 

While of Babylon, in general, it is said, that it would 
be taken from thence ; and -while, in many places, nothing 
is left, yet of the burnt mountain, which forms an accu- 
mulation of ruins enough in magnitude to build a city, 

* Rich's Memoir, p. 36. \ Mignan's Travels, p. 206. 

% Travels, vol. ii. p. 311. 

§ Buckingham's Travels, vol. ii. p. 332. 

^ Porter's Travels, vol. ii. p. 329 



228 BABYLON 

men do not take a stone for foundations nor a stone for 
a corner. Having undergone the action of the fiercest 
fire, and being completely molten, the masses on the 
summit of Bel, on which the hand of the Lord has been 
stretched, cannot be reduced into any other form or sub- 
stance, nor built up again by the hand of man. And 
the tower of Babel, afterward the temple of Belus, 
which witnessed the first dispersion of mankind, shall 
itself be witnessed by the latest generation, even as now 
it stands, desolate for ever, — an indestructible monument 
of human pride and folly, and of Divine judgment and 
truth. The greatest of the ruins, as one of the edifices 
of Babylon, is rolled down into a vast, indiscriminate, 
cloven, confounded, useless, and blasted mass, from 
which fragments might be hurled with as little injury to 
the ruined heap, as from a bare and rocky mountain's 
side. Such is the triumph of the word of the living God 
over the proudest of the temples of Baal. 

Merodach is broken in pieces, Merodach was a name, 
or a title, common to the princes and kings of Babylon, 
of which, in the brief Scriptural references to their his- 
tory, two instances are recorded, viz. Merodach-baladan, 
the son of Baladan, King of Babylon, who exercised 
the office of government, and Evil-Merodach, who lived 
in the days of Jeremiah. From Merodach being here 
associated with Bel, or the temple of Belus, and from 
the similarity of their judgments — the one lowed down 
and confounded, and the other broken in pieces — it may 
reasonably be inferred that some other famous Baby- 
lonian building is here also denoted ; while, at the same 
time, from the express identity of the name with that of 
the kings of Babylon, and even with Evil-Merodach, then 
residing there, it may with equal reason be inferred that, 
under the name of Merodach, the palace is spoken of by 
the prophet. And next to the idolatrous temple, as the 
seat of false worship which corrupted and destroyed the 
nations, it may well be imagined that the royal resi- 
dence of the despot who made the earth to tremble and 
oppressed the people of Israel, would be selected as the 
marked object of the righteous judgments of God. And 
secondary only to the Birs Nimrood in the greatness 
of its ruins is the Mujelibe, or Makloube, generally un- 
derstood and described by travellers as the remains of 
f he chief palace of Babylon. 

The palace of the King of Babylon almost vied with 



BABYLON 229 

the great temple of their god. And there is now some 
controversy, in which of the principal mountainous 
heaps the one or the other lies buried. But the utter 
desolation of both leaves no room for any debate on the 
question, — which of the twain is bowed down and con- 
founded, and which of them is broken in pieces. 

The two palaces, or castles, of Babylon were strongly 
fortified. And the larger was surrounded by three walls 
of great extent.* When the city was suddenly taken 
by Demetrius, he seized on one of the castles by sur- 
prise, and displaced its garrison by seven thousand of 
his own troops, whom he stationed within it.f Of the 
other he could not make himself master. Their extent 
and strength, at a period of three hundred years after 
the delivery of the prophecy, are thus sufficiently de- 
monstrated. The solidity of the structure of the greater 
as well as of the lesser palace might have warranted 
the belief of its unbroken durability for ages. — And 
never was there a building whose splendour and magni- 
ficence were in greater contrast to its present desolation. 
The vestiges of the walls which surrounded it are still 
to be seen, and serve with other circumstances to iden- 
tify it with the Mujelibe, as the name Merodach is iden- 
tified with the palace. It is broken in pieces, and hence 
its name Mujelibe, signifying overturned, or turned up- 
side down. Its circumference is about half a mile ; its 
height one hundred and forty feet. But it is " a mass 
of confusion, none of its members being distinguish- 
able."} The existence of chambers, passages, and cel- 
lars, of different forms and sizes, and built of different 
materials, has been fully ascertained.^ It is the recep- 
tacle of wild beasts, and full of doleful creatures ; wild 
beasts cry in the desolate houses, and dragons in the 
pleasant palaces — "venomous reptiles being very nume • 
rous throughout the ruins." || " All the sides are worn 
into furrows by the weather, and in some places where 
several channels of rain have united together, these 
furrows are of great depth, and penetrate a considerable 
way into the mound.'T " The sides of the ruin exhibit 
hollows worn partly by the weather. "** It is brought 
down to the grave, to the sides of the pit. 

* Diodor. Sic. lib. 2. Herod, lib. i. c. 181. 
t Plutarch's Life of Demetrius. 
f Delia Valle. Buckingham's Travels, vol. ii. p. 273. 
j Ibid. p. 274. I! Mighan's Travels, p. 168. 

If Rich's Memoir, p. 29, ** Mignan's Travels, p. 167 

20 



230 BABYLON. 

They that see thee shall narrowly look upon thee, and con- 
sider thee, saying, Is this the man that made the earth to 
tremble, that did shake kingdoms ? Narrowly to look on 
and to consider even the view of the Mujelibe, is to see 
what the palace of Babylon, in which kings, proud as 
" Lucifer," boasted of exalting themselves above the stars 
of God, has now become, and how, cut down to the ground, 
it is broken in pieces.* 

" On pacing over the loose stones, and fragments of 
brick-work which lay scattered through the immense 
fabric, and surveying the sublimity of the ruins," says 
Captain Mignan, " I naturally recurred to the time when 
these walls stood proudly in their original splendour, — 
when the halls were the scenes of festive magnificence, 
and when they resounded to the voices of those whom 
death has long since swept from the earth. This very 
pile was once the seat of luxury and vice ; now aban- 
doned to decay, and exhibiting a melancholy instance of 
the retribution of Heaven. It stands alone ; — the soli- 
tary habitation of the goatherd marks not the forsaken 
site."f Thy pomp is brought down to the grave, and the 
noise of thy vials ; the worms are spread under thee, and the 
worms cover thee. 

Thou art cast out of thy grave like an abominable branch, 
and as the raiment of those that are slain, thrust through 
with a sword, that go down to the stones of the pit ; as a 
carcass trodden under feet. " Several deep excavations have 
been made in different places into the sides of the Mu- 
jelibe ; some probably by the wearing of the seasons ; 
but many others have been dug by the rapacity of the 
Turks, tearing up its bowels in search of hidden trea- 
sure," — as if the palace of Babylon were cast out of its grave. 
" Several penetrate very far into the body of the struc- 
ture," till it has become as the raiment of those that are 
slam, thrust through with a sword. " And some, it is likely, 

* By the kindness of Sir Robert Ker Porter's family, in his absence abroad, 
the author was presented with the original drawings of the Birs Nimrooi and 
Mujelibe, for engravings. His Travels in Persia, Babylonia, &c. contain four 
views of each, which show how, on every side, they are bowed down and 
broken in pieces. Small engravings of them are inserted in Mines de V Orient, 
Viemie, in Rich's Memoirs on the ruins of Babylon, and in Mr. Buckingham's 
Travels. There is a view of each in Captain Mignan's Travels. The curious 
reader mav contrast the Mujelibe with Martin's splendid picture of ;k Belshaz- 
zar's Feast." Tlie place, no longer a palace, is the same. Every child is familiar 
with the common picture of the temple of Belus, the ancient magn txence 
of which could not well be exaggerated, any more than the faintest resemblance 
to it could be recognised in what now it is— the Birs Nimrood. 

t Mignan's Travels, p. 172, 173. 



BABYLON. 231 

have never yet been explored, the wild beasts of the desert 
literally keeping guard over them."* " The mound was 
full of large holes"f — thrust through. 

Near to the Mujelibe, on the supposed site of the hang- 
ing gardens which were situated within the walls of the 
palace, " the ruins are so perforated in consequence of 
the digging for bricks, that the original design is entirely 
lost. All that could favour any conjecture of gardens 
built on terraces are two subterranean passages. — There 
can be no doubt that both passages are of vast extent ; 
they are lined with bricks laid in with bitumen and 
covered over with large masses of stone. This is nearly 
the only place where stone is observable. "J Arches 
built upon arches raised the hanging-gardens from terrace 
to terrace, till the highest was on a level with the top of 
the city walls. Now they are cast out like an abominable 
branch — and subterranean passages are disclosed, — down 
to the stones of the pit. 

As a carcass trodden under feet. The streets of Babylon 
were parallel, crossed by others at right angles, and 
abounded with houses three and four stories high ;§ and 
none can now traverse the site of Babylon, or find any 
other path without treading them underfoot. The traveller 
directs his course to the highest mounds ; and there are 
none, whether temples or palaces, that are not trodden on. 
The Mujelibe " rises in a steep ascent, over which the pas- 
sengers can only go up by the winding paths worn by fre- 
quent visits to the ruined edifice."] 

Her idols are confounded, her images are broken in pieces ; 
all the graven images of her gods he hath broken unto the 
ground. " This place," says Beauchamp, quoted by Ma- 
jor Rennell, " and the mount of Babel, are commonly called 
by the Arabs Makloube, that is, turned topsy-turvy. I 
was informed by the master mason employed to dig for 
bricks, that the places from which he procured them 
were large thick walls and sometimes chambers. He 
has frequently found earthen vessels, engraved marbles, 
and about eight years ago a statue as large as life, which 
he threw among the rubbish. On one wall of the chamber 
he found the figure of a cow, and of the sun and moon, 
formed of varnished bricks. Sometimes idols of clay 
are found representing human figures."^" " Small figures 

* Sir R. K. Porter's Travels, vol. ii. p. 342. 

t Keppel's Travels, vol. i. p. 179. t Tbid. p. 205. 

§ Herod, lib. i. c. 180. j| Buckingham's Travels, vol. ii. p. 258, 

TC Rennell's Geography o Herodotus, p. 368. 



232 BABYLON. 

of brass or copper are found at Babylon.*'* " Bronze an. 
tiquities, generally much corroded with rust, but exhibit- 
ing small figures of men and animals, are often found 
among the ruins. "f 

The broad walls of Babylon shall be utterly broken. They 
were so broad, that, as ancient historians relate, six 
chariots could be driven on them abreast ; or a chariot 
and four horses might pass and turn. They existed as 
walls for more than a thousand years after the prophecy 
was delivered; and long after the sentence of utter de- 
struction had gone forth against them they were numbered 
among " the seven wonders of the world." And what 
can be more wonderful now, or what could have been 
more inconceivable by man, when Babylon was in its 
strength and glory, than that the broad walls of Babylon 
should be so utterly broken that it cannot be determined 
with certainty that even the slightest vestige of them 
exists. 

" All accounts agree," says Mr. Rich, " in the height 
of the walls, which was fifty cubits, having been reduced 
to these dimensions from the prodigious height of three 
hundred and fifty feet" (formerly stated, by the lowest 
computation of the length of the cubit, at three hundred 
feet), " by Darius Hystaspes, after the rebellion of the 
town, in order to render it less defensible. I have not 
been fortunate enough to discover the least trace of them 
in any part of the ruins at Hillah ; which is rather an 
unaccountable circumstance, considering that they sur- 
vived the final ruin of the town, long after which they 
served as an enclosure for a park ; in which compara- 
tively perfect state St. Jerome informs us they remained 
in his time."J 

In the sixteenth century they were seen for the last 
time by any European traveller (so far as the author has 
been able to trace), before they were finally so utterly 
broken as totally to disappear. And it is interesting to 
mark both the time and the manner in which the walls 
of Babylon, like the city of which they were the im- 
pregnable yet unavailing defence, were brought down to 
the grave, to be seen no more. 

" The meanwhile," as Rauwolff describes them, " when 
we were lodged there, I considered and viewed *>his ascent, 
and found that there were two behind one another" 

* Rich's Second Memoir, p. 58. t Mignan's Travels, p. 229. 

% Rich's Memoirs, p. 43, 44. 



BABYLON. 233 

(Herodotus states that there was both an inner, or infe- 
rior, and outer wall), " distinguished by a ditch, and ex- 
tending themselves like unto two parallel walls a great 
way about, and that they were open in some places, 
where one might go through like gates ; wherefore I be- 
lieve that they were the wall of the old town that went 
about them ; and that the places where they were open 
have been anciently the gates (whereof there were one 
hundred) of that town. And this the rather because I 
saw in some places under the sand (wherewith the two 
ascents were almost covered) the old wall plainly appear."* 

The cities of Seleucia, Ctesiphon, Destagered, Kufa, 
and anciently many others in the vicinity, together with 
the more modern towns of Mesched Ali, Mesched Hus- 
sein, and Hillah, " with towns, villages, and caravansaries 
without number,"! have, in all probability, been chiefly 
built out of the walls of Babylon. Like the city, the 
walls have been taken from thence, till none of them are 
left. The rains of many hundred years, and the waters 
coming upon them annually by the overflowing of the 
Euphrates, have also, in all likelihood, washed down the 
dust and rubbish from the broken and dilapidated walls 
into the ditch from which they were originally taken, 
till at last the sand of the parched desert has smoothed 
them into a plain, and added the place where they stood 
to the wilderness, so that the broad walls of Babylon are 
utterly broken. And now, as the subjoined evidence, 
supplementary of what has already been adduced, fully 
proves, — it may verily be said that the loftiest walls ever 
built by man, as well as the " greatest city on which the 
sun ever shone," which these walls surrounded, and the 
most fertile of countries, of which Babylon the great 
was the capital and the glory, — have all been swept by 
the Lord of Hosts with the besom of destruction. 

A chapter of sixty pages in length, of Mr. Bucking- 
ham's Travels in Mesopotamia, is entitled, " Search after 
the walls of Babylon." After a long and fruitless search, 
he discovered on the eastern boundary of the ruins, on 
the summit of an oval mound from seventy to eighty feet 
in height, and from three to four hundred feet in circum- 
ference, " a mass of solid wall, about thirty feet in length, 
by twelve or fifteen in thickness, yet evidently once of 
much greater dimensions each way, the work being, in 

* Ray's Collection of Travels, p. 177, 178. 

t Sir R. K. Porter's Travels, vol. ii. p. 338. 

20* 



234 BABYLON. 

its present state, broken and incomplete in every part ;"* 
and this heap of ruin and fragment of wall he conjec- 
tured to be a part — the only part, if such it be, that can 
be discovered — of the walls of Babylon, so utterly arc 
they broken. Beyond this there is not even a pretension 
to the discovery of any part of them. 

Captain Frederick, of whose journey it was the "prin 
cipal object to search for the remains of the wall and 
ditch that had compassed Babylon," states that " neither 
of these have been seen by any modern traveller. All 
my inquiries among the Arabs," he adds, " on this sub- 
ject completely failed in producing the smallest effect. 
Within the space of twenty-one miles in length along 
the banks of the Euphrates, and twelve miles across it 
in breadth, I was unable to perceive any thing that could 
admit of my imagining that either a wall or a ditch had 
existed within this extensive area. If any remains do 
exist of the walls, they must have been of greater cir- 
cumference than is allowed by modern geographers. I 
may possibly have been deceived ; but I spared no pains 
to prevent it. I never was employed in riding and walk- 
ing less than eight hours for six successive days, and 
upwards of twelve on the seventh."! 

Major Keppel relates that he and the party who ac- 
companied him, " in common with other travellers, had 
totally failed in discovering any trace of the city walls ;" 
and he adds, " the Divine predictions against Babylon 
have been so literally fulfilled in the appearance of the 
ruins, that I am disposed to give the fullest signification 
to the words of Jeremiah, — the broad walls of Babylon 
shall be utterly broken "% 

Babylon shall be an astonishment. — Every one that goeth 
by Babylon shall be astonished. It is impossible to think 
on what Babylon was, and to be an eyewitness of what 
it is, without astonishment. On first entering its ruins, 
Sir Robert Ker Porter thus expresses his feelings, "I 
could not but feel an indescribable awe in thus passing, 
as it were, into the gates of fallen Babylon."^ — " I can- 
not portray," says Captain Mignan, " the overpowering 
sensation of reverential awe that possessed my mind 
while contemplating the extent and magnitude of ruin 
and devastation on every side."|| 

* Buckingham's Travels, vol. ii. p. 306, 307. 

t Transactions of the Literary Society, Bombay, vol. i. p. 130, 131. 

t Keppel's Narrative, vol. i. p. 175. Jer. Ii. 58. 

§ Sir R. K, Porter's Travels, vol, ii. p. 294. || Mignan's Travels, p. 117. j 



BABYLON 235 

How is the hammer of the whole earth cut asunder ! 
How is Babylon become a desolation among the nations ! 
■ — The following interesting description has lately been 
given from the spot. After speaking of the ruined em- 
bankment, divided and subdivided again and again, like a 
sort of tangled network, over the apparently intermina- 
ble ground — of large and wide-spreading morasses— of 
ancient, foundations — and of. chains of undulated heaps 
— Sir Robert Ker Porter emphatically adds : — " The 
whole view was particularly solemn. The majestic 
stream of the Euphrates, wandering in solitude, like a 
pilgrim monarch through the silent ruins of his devastated 
kingdom, still appeared a noble river, under all the disad- 
vantages of its desert-tracked course. Its banks were 
hoary with reeds ; and the gray osier willows were yet 
there on which the captives of Israel hung up their 
harps, and, while Jerusalem was not, refused to be com- 
forted. But how is the rest of the scene changed since 
then ! At that time those broken hills were palaces — 
those long undulating mounds, streets — this vast solitude 
filled with the busy subjects of the proud daughter of 
the East. — Now, wasted with misery, her habitations are 
not to be found — and for herself, the ivorm is spread over 
her."* 

From palaces converted into broken hills ; — from streets 
to long lines of heaps ; — from the throne of the world to 
sitting on the dust ; — from the hum of mighty Babylon 
to the death-like silence that rests upon the grave to which 
it is brought down; — from the great storehouse of the 
world, where treasures were gathered from every quar- 
ter, and the prison-house of the captive Jews, where, not 
loosed to return homewards, they served in a hard bond- 
age, to Babylon the spoil of many nations, itself taken 
from thence, and nothing left ; — from a vast metropolis, 
the place of palaces and the glory of kingdoms, whither 
multitudes ever flowed, to a dreaded and shunned spot 
not inhabited nor dwelt in from generation to generation, 
where even the Arabian, though the son of the desert, 
pitches not his tent, and where the shepherds make not 
their folds ;— from the treasures of darkness, and hidden 
riches of secret places, to the taking away of bricks, and 
to an uncovered nakedness ; — from making the earth to 
tremble, and shaking kingdoms, to being cast out of the 

* Sir R. K. Porter's Travels, vol. ii. p. 207. 



230 BABYLON. 

grave like an abominable branch ; — from the many nations 
and great kings from the coasts of the earth that have 
so often come up against Babylon, to the workmen that 
still cast her up as heaps and add to the number of pools 
in the ruins ; — from the immense artificial lake, many 
miles in circumference, by means of which the annual 
rising of the Euphrates was regulated and restrained, to 
these pools of water, a few yards round, dug by the 
workmen, and filled by the river; — from the first and 
greatest of temples to a burnt mountain desolate for 
ever; from the golden image, forty feet in height, which 
stood on the top of the temple of Belus, to all the graven 
images of her gods, that are broken unto the ground and 
mingled with the dust ; — from the splendid and luxuriant 
festivals of Babylonian monarchs, the noise of the viols, 
the pomp of Belshazzar's feast, and the godless revelry 
of a thousand lords drinking out of the golden vessels 
that had been taken from Zion, to the cry of wild beasts, 
the creeping of doleful creatures of which their desolate 
houses and pleasant palaces are full, the nestling of owls 
in cavities, the dancing of wild goats on the ruinous 
mound as on a rock, and the dwelling-place of dragons 
and of venomous reptiles; — from arch upon arch, and 
terrace upon terrace, till the hanging gardens of Babylon 
rose like a mountain, down to the stones of the pit now 
disclosed to view ; — from the palaces of princes who sat 
on the mount of the congregation, and thought in the 
pride of their hearts to exalt themselves above the stars 
of God, to heaps cut down to the ground, perforated as 
the raiment of those that are slain, and as a carcass trod- 
den under feet ; — from the broad walls of Babylon, in all 
their height, as Cyrus camped against them round about, 
seeking in vain a single point where congregated nations 
could scale the walls or force an opening, to the untrace- 
able spot on which they stood, when there is nothing 
left to turn aside, or impede in their course, the worms 
that cover it ; — and finally, from Babylon the great, the 
wonder of the world, to fallen Babylon, the astonishment 
of all who go by it ; — in extremes like these, whatever 
changes they involve, and by whatever instrumentality 
they may have been wrought out, there is not to this 
hour, in this most marvellous history of Babylon, a sin- 
gle fact that may not most appropriately be ranked under 
a prediction, and that does not tally entirely with its ex- 
press and precise fulfilment, while at the same time they 



TYRE. 237 

nil united show, as may now be seen, — reading the judg- 
ments to the very letter, and looking to the facts as they 
are, — the destruction which has come from the Almighty 
upon Babylon. 

Has not every, purpose of the Lord been performed 
against Babylon 1 And having so clear illustrations of 
the facts before us, what mortal shall give a negative 
answer to the questions, subjoined by their Omniscient 
Author to these very prophecies 1 — " Who hath declared 
this from ancient time? Who hath told it from that 
time ? Have not I, the Lord 1 and there is no god be- 
side me ; — declaring the end from the beginning, and 
from ancient times the things that are not yet done — 
saying, my counsel shall stand, and I will do all my 
pleasure." Is it possible that there can be any attesta- 
tion of the truth of prophecy, if it be not witnessed here ? 
Is there any spot on earth which has undergone a more 
complete transformation 1 ? "The records of the human 
race," it has been said with truth, " do not present a con- 
trast more striking than that between the primeval mag- 
nificence of Babylon and its long desolation."* Its ruins 
have of late been carefully and scrupulously examined 
by different natives of Britain, of unimpeached veracity, 
and the result of every research is a more striking de- 
monstration of the literal accomplishment of every pre- 
diction. How few spots are there on earth of which 
we have so clear and faithful a picture as prophecy 
gave of fallen Babylon, at a time when no spot on earth 
resembled it less than its present desolate solitary site ! 
Or could any prophecies respecting any single place have 
been more precise, or wonderful, or numerous, or true, 
— or more gradually accomplished throughout many gen- 
erations 1 And when they look at what Babylon was, 
and what it is, and perceive the minute realization of 
them all — may not nations learn wisdom, may not 
tyrants tremble, and may not skeptics think 1 

TYRE. 

Tyre was the most celebrated city of Phoenicia, and 
the ancient emporium of the world. Its colonies were 
numerous and extensive. " It was the theatre of an im- 
mense commerce and navigation — the nursery of arts 

* Edinburgh Review, No. I. p 439. 



238 TYRE. 

and science, and the city of perhaps the most industrious 
and active people ever known."* The kingdom of Car- 
thage, the rival of Rome, was one of the colonies of 
Tyre. While this mart of nations was in the height of 
its opulence and power, and at least one hundred and 
twenty-five years before the destruction of old Tyre, 
Isaiah pronounced its irrevocable fall. Tyre on the 
island succeeded to the more ancient city on the con- 
tinent; and — being inhabited by the same people, re- 
taining the same name, being removed but a little space, 
and, perhaps, occupying in part the same ground — the 
fate of both is included in the prophecy. The pride and 
the wickedness of the Tyrians, their exultation over 
the calamities of the Israelites, and their cruelty in 
selling them to slavery are assigned as the reasons of 
the judgments that were to overtake them, or as the 
causes of the revelation of the destiny of their city. 
And the whole fate of Tyre was foretold. 

Bishop Newton shows, at length, how the following 
prophecies were all exactly fulfilled, as well as clearly 
foretold, viz. that Tyre was to be taken and destroyed 
by the Chaldeans, who were, at the time of the delivery 
of the prophecy, an inconsiderable people, and particu- 
larly by Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon ; — that the 
inhabitants should fly over the Mediterranean into the 
islands and countries adjoining, and even then should not 
find a quiet settlement ; — that the city should be restored 
after seventy years, and return to her gain and merchan- 
dise ; — that the people should in time forsake their idol- 
atry, and become converts to the true religion and wor- 
ship of God ; — and, finally, that the city should be totally 
destroyed, and become a place only for fishers to spread 
their nets upon. 

But, instead of reviewing the whole of these, a few 
of the most striking predictions which were accom- 
plished after the era of the last of the Old Testament 
prophets, and the fulfilment of which rests on the most 
unexceptionable testimony, shall be selected. 

One of the most singular events in history was the 
manner in which the siege of Tyre was conducted by 
Alexander the Great. Irritated that a single city should 
alone oppose his victorious march, enraged at the murder 
of some of his soldiers, and fearful for his fame, — even 

* Volney's Travels, vol. ii. p. 210. Steph. Die. p. 2039. Mars. Can. Ch. 
p. 304, &c— Strabo. 



TYRE. 239 

his army's despairing- of success could not deter him from 
the siege. And Tyre was taken in a manner the success 
of which was more wonderful than the design was daring; 
for it was surrounded by a wall one hundred and fifty feet 
in height, and situated on an island half a mile distant 
from the shore. A mound was formed from the conti- 
nent to the island; and the ruins of old Tyre,* two hun- 
dred and forty years after its demolition, afforded ready 
materials for the purpose. Such was the work, that the 
attempts at first defeated the power of an Alexander. 
The enemy consumed and the storm destroyed it. But 
its remains, buried beneath the water, formed a barrier 
which rendered successful his renewed efforts. A vast 
mass of additional matter was requisite. The soil and 
the very rubbish were gathered and heaped. And the 
mighty conqueror, who afterward failed in raising again 
any of the ruins of Babylon, cast those of Tyre into the 
sea, and took her very dust| from off her. He left not 
the remnant of a ruin — and the site of ancient Tyre is 
now unknown.^ Who then taught the prophets to say 
of Tyre, — " They shall lay thy stones, and thy timber, and 
thy dust in the midst of the water — I will also scrape her 
dust from her. I will make thee a terror, and thou shalt be 
no more. Thou shalt be sought for, yet thou shalt never be 
found again ?"§ 

After the capture of Tyre, the conqueror ordered it to 
be set on fire. Fifteen thousand of the Tynans escaped 
in ships. And, exclusive of multitudes that were cruelly 
slain, thirty thousand were sold into slavery. Each of 
these facts had been announced for centuries : — "Behold 
the Lord will cast her out — he will smite her power in the sea, 
and >he shall be devoured with fire — I will bring forth a fire 
from the midst of thee — i" will bring thee to ashes upon the 
earth. Pass ye over to Tarshish — pass over to Chittim. 
The isles that are in the sea shall be troubled at thy depart' 
ure. — Thou shalt die the death of them that are slain in the 
midst of the sea. The children of Israel also, and the chil- 
dren of Judah, have ye sold. I will return the recompense 
upon your own head." 

But it was also prophesied of the greatest commercial 

* Magna vis saxorum ad marram erat, Tyro vetere praebente. — Quint. Cur. 
lib. iv. cap. 9, 

7 Humus aggerabatur.— Ibid. cap. 11. Arrian. de. Ex. At. lib. ii. c. 21-24. 
Quint. Cur. lib. iv. c. 7-19. 

I Volney's Travels, vol. ii. Pococtc's Description of tbe East, b. i. c. 20. 
Buckingham's Travels, p. 46 

§ Eze}.\ xxiv. 4, 12. 21 



240 TYRE. 

city of the world, whose merchants were princes, — 
whose traffickers were the honourable of the earth, — 
" I will make thee like the top of a rock. Thou shalt be a 
place to spread nets upon"* The same prediction is re- 
peated with an assurance of its truth : — " I will make her 
like the top of a rock ; it shall be a place for the spreading of 
nets in the midst of the sea, for I have spoken it," 

Tyre, though deprived of its former inhabitants, soon 
revived as a city, and greatly regained its commerce. 
It was populous and flourishing at the beginning of the 
Christian era. It contained many disciples of Jesus, 
in the days of the apostles. An elegant temple and 
many churches were afterward built there. It was the 
see of the first archbishop under the patriarch of Jerusa- 
lem. Her merchandise and her hire, according to the 
prophecy, were holiness to the Lord. In the seventh 
century Tyre was taken by the Saracens. In the 
twelfth by the Crusaders — at which period it was a 
great commercial city. The Mamelukes succeeded as 
its masters ; and it has now remained for three hun- 
dred years in the possession of the Turks. But it was 
not excluded from among the multitude of cities and of 
countries whose ruin and devastation, as accomplished 
by the cruelties and ravages of Turkish barbarity and 
despotism, were foretold nearly two thousand years 
before the existence of that nation of plunderers. And 
although it has more lately, by a brief respite from the 
greatest oppression, risen somewhat from its ruins, the 
last of the predictions respecting it has been literally 
fulfilled, according to the testimony of many witnesses. 
But that of Maundrell, Shaw, Volney, and Bruce may 
suffice : — 

" You find here no similitude of that glory for which 
it was so renowned in ancient times. You see nothing 
here but a mere Babel of broken walls, pillars, vaults, &c. 
Its present inhabitants are only a few poor wretches, 
harbouring themselves in the vaults, and subsisting 
chiefly upon fishing, who seem to be preserved in this 
place by Divine Providence, as a visible argument how 
God hath fulfilled his word concerning Tyre."f " The 
port of Tyre, small as it is at present, is choked up to 
that degree with sand and rubbish, that the boats of 
those fishermen who now and then visit this once re- 

* Ezek. xxvi. 14, 15. 

t Maundrell's Journey from Aleppo to Jerusalem, p. 82. 



EGYPT. 24. 

nowned emporium, and dry their nets upon its rocks 
and ruins, can with great difficulty only be admitted."* 
And even Volney, after quoting the description of the 
greatness of Tyre, and the general description of the 
destruction of the city, and the annihilation of its com- 
merce, acknowledges that " the vicissitudes of time, or 
rather the barbarism of the Greeks of the Lower Em- 
pire and the Mahometans, have accomplished this predic- 
tion. — Instead of that ancient commerce, so active and 
so extensive, Sour (Tyre), reduced to a miserable vil- 
lage, has no other trade than the exportation of a few 
sacks of corn and raw cotton ; nor any merchant but a 
single Greek factor, in the service of the French of 
Saide, who scarcely makes sufficient profit to maintain 
his family." But though he overlooks the fulfilment of 
minuter prophecies, he relates facts more valuable than 
any opinion, and more corroborative of their truth : — " The 
whole village of Tyre contains only fifty or sixty poor 
families, who live obscurely on the produce of their 
little ground and a trifling fishery. The houses they 
occupy are no longer, as in the time of Strabo, edifices 
of three or four stories high — but wretched huts, ready 
to crumble into ruins."f Bruce describes Tyre as " a 
rock whereon fishers dry their nets." 

It matters not by what means these prophecies have 
been verified ; for the means were as inscrutable, and as 
impossible to have been foreseen by man, as the event. 
The fact is beyond a doubt that they have been literally 
fulfilled — and therefore the prophecies are true. They 
may be overlooked — but no ingenuity can pervert them. 
No facts could have been more unlikely or striking — and 
no predictions respecting them could have been more 
clear. 

EGYPT. 

Egypt was one of the most ancient and one of the 
mightiest of kingdoms, and the researches of the travel- 
lerare still directed to explore the unparalleled memorials 
of its power. No nation, whether of ancient or of 
modern times, has ever erected such great and duraole 
monuments. While the vestiges of other ancient mon- 
archies can hardly be found amid the mouldered ruins 

* Shaw's Travels, vol. ii. p 31. t Volney's Travels, vol. ii. p. 212 
21 L 



242 EGYPT. 

of their cities, those artificial mountains, visible at the 
distance of thirty miles, the pyramids of Egypt, without 
a record of their date, have withstood, unimpaired, all 
the ravages of time. The dynasty of Egypt takes pre- 
cedence, in antiquity, of every other. No country ever 
produced so long a catalogue of kings. The learning of 
the Egyptians was proverbial. The number of their 
cities,* and the population of their country, as recorded 
by ancient historians, almost surpass credibility. Na* 
ture and art united in rendering it a most fertile region. 
It was called the granary of the world. It was divided 
into several kingdoms, and their power often extended 
over many of the surrounding countries. f Yet the 
knowledge of all its greatness and glory deterred not the 
Jewish prophets from declaring, that Egypt would be- 
come a base kingdom, and never exalt itself any more 
among the nations. And the literal fulfilment of every 
prophecy affords as clear a demonstration as can pos- 
sibly be given, that each and all of them are the dictates 
of inspiration. 

Egypt was the theme of many prophecies, which 
were fulfilled in ancient times : and it bears to the pres- 
ent day, as it has borne throughout many ages, every 
mark with which prophecy had stamped its destiny : — 

"They shall be a base kingdom. It shall be the 
basest of kingdoms. Neither shall it exalt itself any 
more among the nations : for I will diminish them that 
they shall no more rule over the nations. The pride 
of her power shall come down. And they shall be deso- 
late in the midst of the countries that are desolate, and 
her cities shall be in the midst of the cities that are 
wasted. I will make the land of Egypt desolate, and 
the country shall be desolate of that wirereof it was full. 
I will sell the land into the hand of the wicked. I will 
make the land waste and all that is therein, by the hand 
of strangers. I the Lord have spoken it. And there 
shall be no more a prince of the land of Egypt — The 
sceptre of Egypt shall depart away."J 

Egypt became entirely subject to the Persians about 
three hundred and fifty years previous to the Christian 
era. It was afterward subdued by the Macedonians, 
and w r as governed by the Ptolemies for the space of two 

* Twenty thousand— Herod, lib. ii. c. 177. 

t Marshami Can. Chron. p. 239, 420. 

X Ezek. xxx. 6,7, 12, 13; xxxii. 15. Zcch. x. 11. 



EGYPT. 243 

hundred and ninety-four years ; until, aboil'- thirty years 
before Christ, it became a province of the Roman em- 
pire. It continued long in subjection to the Romans — 
tributary first to Rome, and afterward to Constantinople. 
It was transferred, A. D. 641, to the dominion of the 
Saracens. In 1250 the Mamelukes deposed their rulers, 
and usurped the command of Egypt. A mode of gov- 
ernment the most singular and surprising that ever ex- 
isted on earth was established and maintained. Each 
successive ruler was raised to supreme authority, from 
being a stranger and a slave. No son of the former 
ruler — no native of Egypt succeeded to the sovereignty ; 
but a chief was chosen from among a new race of im- 
ported slaves. When Egypt became tributary to the 
Turks in 1517, the Mamelukes retained much of their 
power, and every pasha was an oppressor and a stran- 
ger. During all these ages, every attempt to emancipate 
the country, or to create a prince of the land of Egypt, 
has proved abortive, and has often been fatal to the as- 
pirant. Though the facts relative to Egypt form too 
prominent a feature in the history of the world to admit 
of contradiction or doubt, yet the description of the fate 
of that country, and of the form of its government, shall 
be left to the testimony of those whose authority no in- 
fidel will question, and whom no man can accuse of 
adapting their descriptions to the predictions of the 
event. Gibbon and Volney are again our witnesses of 
the facts : — 

" Such is the state of Egypt. Deprived twenty-three 
centuries ago of her natural proprietors, she has seen 
her fertile fields successively a prey to the Persians, the 
Macedonians, the Romans, the Greeks, the Arabs, the 
Georgians, and, at length, the race of Tartars distin- 
guished by the name of Ottoman Turks. The Mame- 
lukes, purchased as slaves, and introduced as soldiers, 
soon usurped the power and elected a leader. If their 
firs* establishment was a singular event, their continu- 
ance is not less extraordinary. They are replaced by 
slaves brought from their original country. The system 
of oppression is methodical. Every thing the traveller 
sees or hears reminds him he is in the country of slavery 
and tyranny."* "A more unjust and absurd constitu- 
tion cannot be devised than that which condemns the 

* Voluey's Travels, vol. i. p. 74, 103, 110, 198. 
L2 



244 EGYPT. 

natives of a country to perpetual servitude, under the 
arbitrary dominion of strangers and slaves. Yet such 
has been the state of Egypt above five hundred years. 
The most illustrious sultans of the Baharite and Borgite 
dynasties were themselves promoted from the Tartar 
and Circassian bands ; and the four-and-twenty beys, or 
military chiefs, have ever been succeeded, not by their 
sons, but by their servants."* These are the words of 
Volney and of Gibbon : and what did the ancient pro- 
phets foretel 1 " I will lay the land waste and all that is ■ 
therein by the hands of strangers, I the Lord have spoken 
it, — And there shall be no more a prince of the land of 
Egypt. — The sceptre of Egypt shall depart away" The 
prophecy adds : — " They shall be a base kingdom — it shall 
be the basest of kingdoms." After the lapse of two thou- 
sand and four hundred years from the date of this pro- 
phecy, a scoffer at religion, but an eyewitness of the 
facts, thus describes the salfsame spot : " In Egypt 
there is no middle class, neither nobility, clergy, mer- 
chants, landholders. A universal air of misery, mani- 
fest in ail the traveller meets, points out to him the 
rapacity of oppression and the distrust attendant upon 
slavery. The profound ignorance of the inhabitants 
equally prevents them from perceiving the causes of 
their evils, or applying the necessary remedies. Igno- 
rance, diffused through every class, extends its effects 
to every species of moral and physical knowledge. 
Nothing is talked of but intestine troubles, the public 
misery, pecuniary extortions, bastinadoes, and murders. 
Justice herself puts to death without formality."! Other 
travellers describe the most execrable vices as common, 
and represent the moral character of the people as cor- 
rupted to the core. As a token of the desolation of the 
country, mud-walled cottages are now the only habita- 
tions where the ruins of temples and palaces abound. 
Egypt is surrounded by the dominions of the Turks and 
of the Arabs ; and the prophecy is literally true which 
marked it in the midst of desolation : — " They shall be 
desolate in the midst of the countries that are desolate, and 
her cities shall be in the midst of the cities that are wasted." 
The systematic oppression, extortion, and plunder which 
have so long prevailed, and the price paid for his au- 
thority and power by every Turkish pasha, have ren- 

* Gibbon's History, vol. vi. p. 109, 110. Dublin ed. 17S9. 
t Volney's Travels, vol. : p. 190, 198. 



EGYIT. 245 

dered the country desolate of that whereof it was full, and 
still show, both how it has been toasted by the hands of 
strangers, and how it has been sold into the hand of the 
wicked. 

Can any words be more free from ambiguity, or could 
any events be more wonderful in their nature, or more 
unlikely or impossible to have been foreseen by man, 
than these prophecies concerning Egypt 1 The long 
line of its kings commenced with the first ages of the 
world, and, while it was yet unbroken, its final termina- 
tion was revealed. The very attempt once made by in- 
fidels to show, from the recorded number of its monarchs 
and the duration of their reigns, that Egypt was a king- 
dom previous to the Mosaic era of the deluge, places 
the wonderful nature of these predictions respecting it 
in the most striking view. And the previous experience 
of two thousand years, during which period Egypt had 
never been without a prince of its own, seemed to pre- 
clude the possibility of those predicted events which the 
experience of the last two thousand years has amply 
verified. Though it had often tyrannized over Judea 
and the neighbouring nations, the Jewish prophets fore- 
told that its own sceptre would depart away ; and that 
that country of kings (for the number of its contem- 
porary as well as successive monarchs may warrant the 
appellation) would never have a prince of its own : and 
that it would be laid waste by the hands of strangers. 
They foretold that it should be a base kingdom — the 
basest of kingdoms — that it should be desolate itself and 
surrounded by desolation — and that it should never 
exalt itself any more among the nations. They described 
its ignominious subjection and unparalleled baseness, 
notwithstanding that its past and present degeneracy 
bears not a more remote resemblance to the former 
greatness and pride of its power, than the frailty of its 
mud-walled fabrics now bears to the stability of its im- 
perishable pyramids. Such prophecies, accomplished 
in such a manner, prove, without a comment, that they 
must be the revelation of the Omniscient Ruler of the 
universe.* 

* Egypt has, indeed, lately risen, under its present spirited but despotic 
pasha~to a degree of political importance and power unknown to it for many 
past centuries. Yet this fact, instead of militating against the truth of pro- 
phecy, may, possibly at no distant period, serve to illustrate another prediction, 
which implies that, however base and degraded it might continue to be 
throughout manv generations, it would, notwithstanding, have strength suf- 
21* 



246 EGYPT. 

On a review of the prophecies relative to Nineveh, 
Babylon, Tyre, and Egypt, may we not, by the plainest 
induction from indisputable facts, conclude that the fate 
of these cities and countries, as well as of the land of 
Judea and the adjoining territories, demonstrates the 
truth of all the prophecies respecting them ? And that 
these prophecies, ratified by the events, give the most 
powerful of testimonies to the truth of the Christian re- 
ligion 1 The desolation was the work of man, and was 
effected by the enemies of Christianity; and would have 
been the same as it is, though not a single prophecy had 
been uttered. It is the prediction of these facts, in all 
their particulars infinitely surpassing human foresight, 
which is the word of God alone. And the ruin of these 
empires, while it substantiates the truth of every iota of 
these predictions, is thus a miraculous confirmation and 
proof of the inspiration of the Scriptures. By what 
fatality is it, then, that infidels should have chosen for 
the display of their power this very field, where, with- 
out conjuring, as they have done, a lying spirit from the 
ruins, they might have read the fulfilment of the pro- 
phecies on every spot 1 — Instead of disproving the truth 
of every religion, the greater these ruins are, the more 
strongly do they authenticate the Scriptural prophecies ; 
and it is not, at least, on this stronghold of the faith 
that the standard of infidelity can be erected. Every 
fact related by Volney is a witness against all his specu- 
lation — and out of his own mouth is he condemned. 
Can any purposed deception be more glaring or great 
than to overlook all these prophecies, and to raise an 
argument against the truth of Christianity from the very 
facts by which they have been fulfilled ? Or can any 
evidence of divine inspiration be more convincing and 
clear, than to view, in conjunction, all these marvellous 
predictions and their perfect completion ? 

ficient to be looked to for aid or protection, even at the time of the restoration 
of the Jews to Judea, who will seek " to strengthen themselves in the strength 
of Pharaoh, and trust in the shadow of Egypt." Other prophecies respecting 
it await their fulfilment. Yet, whatever its present apparent strength may be, 
it is still but " the shadow of Egypt." — Isa. xxx. 2 ; xxxi. 1. The whole 
earth shall yet rejoice ; and Egypt shall not be for ever base. The Lord shall 
smite Egypt ; he. shall smite and heal it ; and they shall return to the Lord, 
arid he shall be entreated of them, and shall heal them. In that day shall 
Israel be the third with Egypt and with Assyria, even, a blessing in the midst 
qfthe land, &c. — Isa. xix. 19-25. 



ARABS. 



CHAPTER VII. 

THE ARABS. 



The history of the Arabs, so opposite, in many re«^ 
spects, to that of the Jews, but as singular as theirs, 
was concisely and clearly foretold. It was prophesied 
concerning Ishmael : — " He will be a wild man ; his 
hand will be against every man, and every man's hand 
will be against him : and he shall dwell in the presence 
of all his brethren. I will make him fruitful, and mul- 
tiply him exceedingly ; and I will make him a great 
nation."* The fate of Ishmael is here identified with 
that of his descendants : and the same character is com- 
mon to them both. The historical evidence of the fact, ! 
the universal tradition, and constant boast of the Arabs 
themselves, their language, and the preservation for 
many ages of an original rite, derived from him as their 
primogenitor, — confirm the truth of their descent from 
Ishmael. The fulfilment of the prediction is obvious. j 
Even Gibbon, while he attempts, from the exceptions 
which he specifies, to evade the force of the fact that 
the Arabs have maintained a perpetual independence, 
acknowledges that these exceptions are temporary and 
local ; that the body of the nation has escaped the yoke 
of the most powerful monarchies ; and that " the arms 
of Sesostris and Cyrus, of Pompey and Trajan, could 
never achieve the conquest of Arabia."f But even the 
exceptions which he specifies, though they were justly 
stated, and though not coupled with such admissions as 
invalidate them, would not detract from the truth of the 
prophecy. The independence of the Arabs was prover- 
bial in ancient as well as in modern times ; and the 
present existence, as a free and independent nation, of a 
people who derive their descent from so high antiquity, 
demonstrates that they had never been wholly subdued, 
as all the nations around them have unquestionably 
been ; and that they have ever dwelt in the presence of 
their brethren. They not only subsist unconquered to 

* Genesis xvi. 12 ; xvii. 20. f Gib. Hist. vol. v. p. 144 



248 ARABS. 

this day, but the prophesied and primitive wiidness oi 
their lace, and their hostility to all, remain unsubdued 
and unaltered. " They are a ivild people ; their hand is 
against every man, and every man's hand is against them" 

In the words of Gibbon, which strikingly assimilate 
with those of the prophecy, they are " armed against 
mankind" Plundering is their profession. Their alli- 
ance is never courted, and can never be obtained ; and all 
that the Turks, or Persians, or any of their neighbours 
can stipulate for from them is a partial and purchased 
forbearance. Even the British, who have established a 
residence in almost every country, have entered the ter- 
ritories of the descendants of Ishmael to accomplish 
only the premeditated destruction of a fort, and to retire. 
It cannot be alleged, with truth, that their peculiar char- 
acter and manner, and its uninterrupted permanency, is 
the necessary result of the nature of their country. 
They have continued wild or uncivilized, and have re- 
tained their habits of hostility towards all the rest of the 
human race, though they possessed for three hundred 
years countries the most opposite in their nature from 
the mountains of Arabia. The greatest part of the tem- 
perate zone was included within the limits of the Ara- 
bian conquests ;* and their empire extended from India 
to the Atlantic, and embraced a wider range of territory 
than ever was possessed by the Romans, those boasted 
masters of the world. The period of their conquest and 
dominion was sufficient, under such circumstances, to 
have changed the manners of any people ; but whether 
in the land of Shinar or in the valleys of Spain, on the 
banks of the Tigris or the Tagus, in Araby the Blessed 
or Araby the Barren, the posterity of Ishmael have ever 
maintained their prophetic character : they have re- 
mained, under every change of condition, a wild people ; 
their hand has still been against every man, and every 
man's hand against them. 

The natural reflection of a recent traveller, on exam- 
ining the peculiarities of an Arab tribe, of which he was 
an eyewitness, may suffice, without any art of contro- 
versy, for the illustration of this prophecy: — "On the 
smallest computation, such must have been the manners 
of those people for more than three thousand years: 
thus in all things verifying the prediction given of Ish- 

* Gibbon, vol. v. p. 226, 317. 



AFRICANS, ETC. 249 

mael at his birth, that he, in his posterity, should be a 
wild man, and always continue to be so, though they 
shall dwell for ever in the presence of their brethren. 
And that an acute and active people, surrounded for ages 
by polished and luxuriant nations, should, from their ear- 
liest to their latest times, be still found a wild people, 
dwelling in the presence of all their brethren (as we may 
call these nations), unsubdued and unchangeable, is, in- 
deed, a standing miracle — one of those mysterious facts 
which establish the truth of prophecy."* 

Recent discoveries have also brought to light the mi- 
raculous preservation and existence, as a distinct people, 
of a less numerous, but not less interesting race — " a 
plant which grew up under the mighty cedar of Israel, 
but w x as destined to flourish when that proud tree was 
levelled to the earth."f " Thus saiththe Lord of Hosts, 
the God of Israel, Jonadab the son of Rechab shall not 
want a man to stand before me for ever. "J The Beni 
Rechab, sons of Rechab, still exist, a " distinct and easily 
distinguishable" people. They boast of their descent 
from Rechab, profess pure Judaism, and all know Hebrew. 
Yet they live in the neighbourhood of Mecca, the chief 
seat of Mahometanism, and their number is stated to be 
sixty thousand. The account given of them by Benja- 
min of Tudela, in the twelfth century,^ has very recently 
been confirmed by Mr. WolrT; and, as he witnessed, and 
heard from an intrepid " Rechabite cavalier," there is not 
wanting a man to stand up as a son of Rechab. 



SLAVERY OF THE AFRICANS EUROPEAN COLONIES IN ASIA. 

Not only do the different countries and cities which 
form the subjects of prophecy exhibit to this day their 
predicted fate, but there is also a prophecy recorded as 
delivered in an age coeval with the deluge, when the 
members of a single family included the whole of the 
human race — the fulfilment of which is conspicuous even 
at the present time. And while the fate of the Jews and 
of the Arabs, throughout many ages, has confirmed, in 

* Sir Robert K. Porter's Travels, p. 304. 

t Quarterly Review, No. Ixxv. p. 142. X J«- xxxv. 19. 

§ Basiiage's History, p. 620: 

L 3 



250 AFRICANS, ETC. 

every instance in which the period of their prediction 
is already past, the prophecies relative to the descend- 
ants of Isaac and of Ishmael — existing facts, which are 
prominent features in the history of the world, are equally 
corroborative of the predictions respecting the sons of 
Noah. The unnatural conduct of Ham, and the dutiful and 
respectful behaviour of Shem and Japhet towards their 
aged father, gave rise to the prediction of the future fate 
of their posterity, without being at all assigned as the cause 
of that fate. But whatever was the occasion on which 
it was delivered, the truth of the prophecy must be tried 
by its completion : — " Cursed be Canaan ; a servant of 
servants shall he be unto his brethren. Blessed be the 
Lord God of Shem, and Canaan shall be his servant. 
God shall enlarge Japhet, and he shall dwell in the tents 
of Shem, and Canaan shall be his servant."* 

The historical part of Scripture, by its describing so 
particularly the respective settlements of the descend- 
ants of Noah, " after their generations in their nations," 
affords to this day the means of trying the truth of the 
prediction, and of ascertaining whether the prophetic 
character, as given by the patriarch of the post-diluvian 
world, be still applicable to the inhabitants of the differ- 
ent regions of the earth which were peopled by the pos- 
terity of Shem, of Ham, and of Japhet. The Isles of 
the Gentiles,] ox the countries beyond the Mediterranean, 
to which they passed by sea, viz. those of Europe, were 
divided by the sons of Japhet. The descendants of Ham 
inhabited Africa and the south-western parts of Asia.J 
The families of the Canaanites were spread abroad. The 
border of the Canaanites was from Sidon.^ The city of 
Tyre was called the daughter of Sidon ; and Carthage, 
the most celebrated city of Africa, was peopled from 
Tyre. And the dwellings of the sons of Shem were 
unto the east,\\ or Asia. The particular allotment, or por- 
tion of each, " after their families, after their tongues, 
in their countries, and in their nations,"^ is distinctly 
specified. And although the different nations descended 
from any one of the sons of Noah have intermingle d 
with each other, and undergone many revolutions, yet 
the three great divisions of the world have remained dis- 
tinct, as separately peopled and possessed by the pos* 
terity of each of the sons of Noah. On thissubjeci 

* Gen. ix. 25, 20, 27. t Ibid, x. 5. t- Tbid. ■ vS Ibid. x. 6, 18, 19. 
[\ Ibid. x. 3b. If Ibid, x .31, 32. - See Mede. Die. I | 



AFRICANS, ETC. 251 

earliest commentators are agreed before the existence 
of those facts which give to the prophecy its fullest 
illustration. The facts themselves by which the predic- 
tion is verified are so notorious and so applicable, that 
the most brief and simple statement may suffice. Be- 
fore the propagation of Christianity, which first spoke 
peace to earth, taught a law of universal love, and called 
all men brethren, slavery everywhere prevailed, and the 
greater part of the human race, throughout all the world, 
were born to slavery, and unredeemed for life. Man can 
now boast of a nobler birthright. But, though long ban- 
ished from almost all Europe, slavery still lingers in 
Africa. That country is distinguished above every other 
as the land of slavery. Slaves at home, and transported 
for slavery, the poor Africans, the descendants of Ham, 
are the servants of servants, or slaves to others. Yet 
so unlikely was this fact to have been foreseen by man, 
that, for centuries after the close of the Old Testament 
history, the inhabitants of Africa disputed with the Ro- 
mans the empire of the world. But Hannibal, who was 
once almost master of Rome and of Europe, was forced 
to yield to, and to own the fate of Carthage. * 

" God shall enlarge Japhet, and he shall dwell in the 
tents of Shem." Some of the ablest interpreters of 
prophecy, of a former age, conceived that this predic- 
tion was fulfilled, not only by the conquests which the 
Macedonians and the Romans obtained over many of the 
countries of Asia, but that the promise or blessing of 
enlargement to Japhet was also verified in a metaphori- 
cal sense, by the extension of the knowledge of true 
religion to the nations of Europe. But it stands not now 
in need of any questionable interpretation, having re- 
ceived a literal accomplishment. What is at present the 
relative situation or connexion of the inhabitants of 
Europe and of Asia, the descendants of Japhet and of 
Shem 1 May not the former be said literally to dwell 
in the tents of the latter 1 Or what simile, drawn from 
the simplicity of primeval ages, could be more strikingly 
graphic of the numerous and extensive European colo- 
nies in Asia 1 And how much have the posterity of 
Japhet been enlarged within the regions of the posterity 
of Shem ] In how many of their ancient cities do they 
dwell ? How many settlements have they established ' l 

* Uv 



252 £i FRICANS, ETC 

— while there is not a single spot m Europe the colony 
or the property of any of the nations whom the Scrip- 
tures represent as descended from Shem, or who inhabit 
any part of that quarter of the world which they pos- 
sessed. And it may be said, in reference to our own 
island, and to the immense extent of the British Asiatic 
dominions, that the natives of the Isles of the Gentiles 
dwell in the tents of the East ! From whence, then, could 
such a prophecy have emanated, but from inspiration by 
Him whose presence and whose prescience are alike un- 
limited by space or by time 1 

Whatever events the prophecies reveal, they never 
sanction any iniquity or evil. The wrath of man 
worketh not the righteousness of God, though it be 
made to praise him. And any defence or attempted 
justification of slavery, or of man .having any moral 
right of property in man r must be sought in vain from 
the fulfilment of this prediction. Nebuchadnezzar was 
he guilty instrument of righteous judgments ; and al- 
though, in the execution of these, he was the servant of 
the Lord, it was his own gain and glory which he 
sought, and after having subdued nations not a few, he 
was driven from men, and had his dwelling with the 
beasts. Never were judgments more clearly marked 
than those which have rested on the Jews in every coun- 
try under heaven. Yet he that toucheth them toucheth 
the apple of his eye ; and the year of recompenses for 
the controversy of Zion shall be the day of the Lord's 
vengeance, when he will plead with all flesh for his 
people and for his heritage. And if these examples 
suffice not to show that it is a wresting of Scripture to 
their destruction, for any to seek from them the vindi 
cation of slavery, because Canaan was to be the servant 
of servants unto his brethren, yet they who profess to 
look here to the holy Scriptures for a warrant, because thai 
fact was foretold, should remember, that though Christ 
was delivered into the hands of his enemies "by the 
determinate counsel and foreknoivledge of God ; it was by 
iviched hands that he was crucified and slain." God 
hath made of one flesh all the nations of the earth. 
And, were the gospel universally and rightly appealed 
to, no other bond would be known among men but that 
of brotherhood. 



THE SEVEN CHURCHES OF ASIA. 253 



CHAPTER VIII. 

THE SEVEN CHURCHES OF ASIA. 

Incomplete as has been the view given in the fore 
going pages of the Evidence of Prophecy, yet do not the 
joint clearness of the prophecies themselves, and the 
profusion of precise facts which show their literal fulfil- 
ment, bid defiance to the most subtle skeptic to forge or 
feign the shadow of a just reason to prove how thev 
could all have been spoken, except by inspiration ol 
God ] The sure word of prophecy has indeed unfolded 
many a desolation which has come upon the earth ; but 
while it thus reveals the operation, in some of its bear- 
ings, of the " mystery of iniquity," it forms, itself, a part 
of the " mystery of godliness:" and it is no less the tes- 
timony of Jesus, because it shows, as far as earthly 
ruins can reveal, the progress and the issue of the domin- 
ion of " other lords" over the hearts of the children of 
men. The sins of men have caused, and the cruelty of 
men has effected, the dire desolations which the word 
of God foretold. Signs and tokens of his judgments 
there indeed have been, but they are never to be found 
but where iniquity first prevailed. And though all other 
warnings were to fail, the sight of his past judgments, 
and the sounding of those that are to come, might teach 
the unrepenting and unconverted sinner to give heed to 
the threatenings of His word, and to the terrors of the 
Lord, and to try his ways and turn unto God, while 
space for repentance may be found, ere, as death leaves 
him, judgment shall find him. And may not the desola- 
tions which God has wrought upon the earth, and that 
accredit his word, wherein life and immortality are 
brought to light, teach the man whose god is the world 
to cease to account it worthy of his worship and of his 
love, and to abjure that " covetousness which is idola- 
try," till the idol of mammon in the temple within shall 
fall, as fell the image of Dagon before the ark of the 
Lord, in which " the testimony" was kept 1 

But naming, as millions do, the name of Christ, with- 
out departing from iniquity, there is another warning 



254 THE SEVEN CHURCHES OF ASIA. 

voice thai nay come more closely to them all. And it 
is not only from the desolate regions where heathens 
dwelt, which show how holy men of old spake as they 
were moved by the Holy Ghost ; but also from the ruins 
of some of the cities where churches were formed by 
apostles, and where the religion of Jesus once existed in 
its purity, that all may learn to know that God is no re- 
specter of persons, and that he will by no means clear 
the guilty. " He that hath an ear let him hear what the 
Spirit saith unto the churches." 

What church could rightfully claim, or ever seek, a 
higher title than that which is given in Scripture to the 
seven churches of Asia, the angels of which were the 
seven stars in the right-hand of Him who is the first 
and the last — of Him that liveth and w T as dead and is 
alive for evermore, and that hath the keys of hell and 
of death ; and which themselves were the seven golden 
candlesticks in the midst of which he walked ] And 
who that hath an ear to hear may not humbly hear and 
greatly profit by what the Spirit said unto them.* 

The Church of Ephesus, after a commendation of 
their first works, to which they were commanded to 
return, were accused of having left their first love, and 
threatened with the removal of their candlestick out of 
its place, except they should repent.f Ephesus is situ- 
ated nearly five miles north of Smyrna. It was the 
metropolis of Lydia, and a great and opulent city, and 
(according to Strabo) the greatest emporium of Asia 
Minor* It was chiefly famous for the temple of Diana, 
H whom all Asia worshipped," which was adorned with 
one hundred and twenty-seven columns of Parian mar- 
ble, each of a single shaft, and sixty feet high, and which 
formed one of the seven wonders of the world. The 
remains of its magnificent theatre, in which it is said that 
twenty thousand people could easily have been seated, 
are yet to be seen.J But " a few heaps of stones, and 
some miserable mud cottages, occasionally tenanted by 
Turks, without one Christian residing there,§ are all the 
remains of ancient Ephesus." It is, as described by 
different travellers, a solemn and most forlorn spot. 
The Epistle to the Ephesians is read throughout the 
world; but there is none in Ephesus to read it now. 
The'y left their first love, they returned not to their first 

* Rev. ii. and iii. f Row ii. 5. { Acts xix. 99. 

$ Arundel's Visiyo (he Seven Church* s of Asia, }• 9ft 



THE SEVEN CHURCHES OF ASIA. 255 

works. Their candlestick has been removed out of its 
place ; and the great city of Ephesus is no more. 

The Church of Smyrna was approved of as " rich," 
and nor judgment was denounced against it. They were 
warned of a tribulation of ten days (the ten years' perse- 
cution by Dioclesian), and were enjoined to be faithful 
unto death, and they would receive a crown of life.* 
And, unlike to the fate of the more famous city of Ephe- 
sus, Smyrna is still a large city, containing nearly one 
hundred thousand inhabitants, with several Greek 
churches ; and an English and other Christian ministers 
have resided in it. The light has indeed become dim, 
but the candlestick has not been wholly removed out of 
its place. 

The Church of Pergamos is commended for holding 
fast the name of the Lord, and not denying his faith, 
during a time of persecution, and in the midst of a 
wicked city. But there were some in it who held doc- 
trines and did deeds which the Lord hated. Against 
them he was to fight with the sword of his mouth; and 
all were called to repent. But it is not said, as of Ephe- 
sus, that their candlestick would be removed out of its 
place. f Pergamos is situated to the north of Smyrna, 
at a distance of nearly sixty-four miles, and " was for- 
merly the metropolis of Hellespontic Mysia." It still 
contains at least fifteen thousand inhabitants, of whom 
fifteen hundred are Greeks, and two hundred Armenians, 
each of whom have a church. 

In the Church of Thyatira, like that of Pergamos, 
some tares were soon mingled with the wheat. He who 
hath eyes like unto a flame of fire discerned both. Yet 
happily for the souls of the people, more than for the 
safety of the city, the general character of that church, 
as it then existed, is thus described : — " I know thy works, 
and charity, and service, and faith, and thy patience, and 
thy works ; and the last to be more than the first. "J 
But against those, for such there were among them, 
who had committed fornication, and eaten things sac- 
rificed unto idols, to whom the Lord gave space to re- 
pent of their fornication, and they repented not, great 
tribulation was denounced : and to every one of them 
was to be given according to their works. These, thus 
warned while on earth in vain, have long since passer?. 

* Rev. ii. b-11 Ibid ii. 12-16. t Ibid. ii. 19. 



256 THE SEVEN CHURCHES OF ASIA. 

where all are daily hastening, to the place where no re- 
pentance can be found, and no work be done. " But 
unto the rest in Thyatira (as many as have not known 
the depths of Satan), I will put upon you, saiththe Lord, 
none other burden."* There were those in Thyatira 
who could save a city. It still exists, while greater 
cities have fallen. Mr. Hartley, who visited it in 1826, 
describes it as " imbosomed in cypresses and poplars. 
The Greeks are said to occupy three hundred houses* 
and the Armenians thirty. Each of them have a church." 

The Church of Sardis differed from those of Perga- 
mos and Thyatira. They had not denied the faith ; but 
the Lord had a few things against them, for there were 
some evil-doers among them, and on those, if they re- 
pented not, judgment was to rest. But in Sardis, great 
though the city was, and founded though the church had 
been by an apostle, there were only a few names which 
had not denied their garments. And to that church the 
Spirit said, " I know thy works, that thou hast a name, 
that thou livest and art dead." But the Lord is long- 
suffering, not willing that any should perish, but that all 
should come to repentance. And the church of Sardis 
was thus warned: — "Be watchful and strengthen the 
things which remain, that are ready to die, for I have 
not found thy works perfect before God. Remember, 
therefore, how thou hast received and heard, and hold 
fast and repent. If, therefore, thou shalt not watch, I 
will come on thee as a thief, and thou shalt not know 
what hour I shall come upon thee."f 

The state of Sardis now is a token that the warning 
was given in vain ; and shows that the threatenings of 
the Lord, when disregarded, become certain judgments. 
Sardis, the capital of Lydia, was a great and~ renowned 
city, where the wealth of Croesus, its king, was accu- 
mulated, and became even a proverb. But now a few 
wretched mud huts, " scattered among the ruins," are 
the only dwellings in Sardis, and form the lowly home 
of Turkish herdsmen, who are its only inhabitants. As 
the seat of a Christian church it has lost — all it had to 
lose — the name. " No Christians reside on the spot." 

" And to the angel of the Church in Philadelphia 
write, These things saith He that is holy, He that is 
true, He that hath the key of David, He that openeth 

* Rev. v. 24. t Ibid. iii. 3, ^ 



THE SEVEN CHURCHES OF ASIA. 257 

and no man shutteth ; and shutteth, and no man openeth ; 
— I know thy works ; behold I have set before thee an 
open door, and no man can shut it; for thou hast a 
little strength, and hast kept my word, and hast not 
denied my name. — Because thou hast kept the word 
of my patience, I also will keep thee from the hour of 
temptation which shall come upon all the world."* 
The promises of the Lord are as sure as his threaten- 
ings. Philadelphia alone long withstood the power of 
the Turks, and, in the words of Gibbon, " at length ca- 
pitulated with the proudest of the Ottomans. Among 
the Greek colonies and churches of Asia, 9 ' he adds, 
" Philadelphia is still erect ; a column in a scene of 
ruins."f "It is indeed an interesting circumstance," 
says Mr. Hartley, " to find Christianity more flourishing 
here than in many other parts of the Turkish empire : 
there is still a numerous Christian population : they 
occupy three hundred houses. Divine service is per- 
formed every Sunday in fi\ r e churches." Nor is it less 
interesting, in these eventful times, and notwithstanding 
the general degeneracy of the Greek church, to learn 
that the present bishop of Philadelphia accounts "the 
Bible the only foundation of all religious belief;" and 
that he admits that " abuses have entered into the 
church which former ages might endure, but the pres- 
ent must put them down." It may well be added, as 
stated by Mr. Hartley,! " the circumstance that Phila- 
delphia is now called Allah-Shehr, the city of God, when 
viewed in connexion with the promises made to that 
church, and especially with that of writing the name of 
the city of God upon its faithful members, is, to say 
the least, a singular concurrence." From the prevailing 
iniquities of men many a sign has been given how ter- 
nble are the judgments of God. But from the fidelity of 
the church in Philadelphia of old, in keeping his word, a 
name and memorial of his faithfulness has been left on 
earth, while the higher glories, promised to those thai 
overcame, shall be ratified in heaven ; and towards them, 
but not them only, shall the glorified Redeemer confirm 
the truth of his blessed words, " Him that overcome tl 
will I make a pillar in the temple of my God ;" even at 
assuredly as Philadelphia, when all else fell around it. 

. * Rev. in. 8, 10. t Hist. c. Ixiv. i Missionary Register, June, 1827. 
22* 



258 THE SEVEN CHURCHES OF ASIA. 

" stood erect," our enemies themselves being judges, " a 
column in a scene of ruins." 

" And unto the angel of the Church of the Laodiceans 
write, — These things saith the Amen, the faithful and 
true witness, the beginning of the creation of God. — I 
know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot ; I 
would thou wert cold or hot. So then, because thou 
art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee 
out of my mouth. Because thou sayest, I am rich and 
increased with goods and have need of nothing; and 
knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and 
poor, and blind, and naked ; I counsel thee to buy of me 
gold tried in the fire that thou mayest be rich, and white 
raiment that thou mayest be clothed, and that the shame 
of thy nakedness do not appear ; and anoint thine eyes 
with eye-salve that thou mayest see."* All the other 
churches were found worthy of some commendation; 
and there was some blessing in them all. The church 
of Ephesus had laboured and had not fainted ; though 
she had forsaken her first love, and the threatened pun- 
ishment, except she repented, was the removal of her 
candlestick out of its place. A faithless and wicked 
few polluted the churches of Pergamos and Thyatira by 
their doctrines or by their lives; but the body was 
sound ; and the churches had a portion in Christ. Even 
in Sardis, though it was dead, there was life in a few 
who had not defiled their garments : " and they shall 
walk with me in white, said the Lord, for they are 
worthy." 

But in what the Spirit said to the church in Laodicea, 
there was not one word of approval ; it was lukewarm, 
without exception ; and therefore it was wholly loathed. 
The religion of Jesus had become to them as an ordinary 
matter. They would attend to it just as they did to other 
things which they loved as well. The sacrifice of the 
Son of God upon the cross was nothing thought of more 
than a common gift by man. They were not constrained 
by the love of Christ more than by other feelings. They 
could repeat the words of the first great commandment 
of the law, and of the second that is like unto it ; but 
they showed no sign that the one or the other was truly 
a law to them. There was no Dorcas among them, who 
out of pure Christian love made clothes for the poor, 

* Rev. iii. 14, &e. 



THE SEVEN CHURCHES OF ASIA. 259 

There was no Philemon, to whom it could be said, 
"The church in thy house," and who could look on a 
servant as " a brother beloved." There was no servant 
who looked to the eye of his Father in heaven more 
than to that of his master on earth, and to the recom- 
pense of eternal reward more than to the hireling- 
wages of a day : and who, by showing all good fidelity, 
sought to adorn the doctrine of God his Saviour in all 
things. There was nothing done, as every thing should 
be, heartily, as to the Lord, and not unto men. 

They neither felt nor lived as if they knew that what- 
soever is not of faith is sin. Their lukewarmness was 
worse, for it rendered their state more hopeless than if 
they had been cold. For sooner would a man in Sardis 
have felt that the chill of death was upon him, and have 
cried out for life, and called to the physician, than would 
a man of Laodicea, who could calmly count his even 
pulse, and think his life secure, while death was preying 
on his vitals. The character of lukewarm Christians, a 
self-contradicting name, is the same in every age. Such 
was the church of the Laodiceans. — But what is that 
city now, or how is it changed from what it was ! 

Laodicea was the metropolis of the Greater Phrygia ; 
and, as heathen writers attest, it was an extensive and 
very celebrated city. Instead of then verging to its de- 
cline, it arose to its eminence only about the beginning 
of the Christian era. " It was the mother-church of 
sixteen bishoprics." Its three theatres, and the im- 
mense circus, which was capable of containing upwards 
of thirty thousand spectators, the spacious remains of 
which (with other ruins buried under ruins) are yet to be 
seen, give proof of the greatness of its ancient wealth 
and population, and indicate too strongly that in that city 
where Christians were rebuked, without exception, for 
their lukewarmness, there were multitudes who were 
lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God. The am- 
phitheatre was built after the Apocalypse was written, 
and the warning of the Spirit had been given to the 
church of the Laodiceans to be zealous and repent ; 
but whatever they there may have heard or beheld, 
their hearts wou]d neither have been quickened to a 
renewed zeal for the service and glory of God, nor 
turned to a deeper sorrow for sin, and to a repentance 
not to be repented of. But the fate of Laodicea, though 
opposite, has been no less marked than that of Philadel- 



260 THE SEVEN CHURCHES OF ASIA. 

phia. There are no sights of grandeur nor scenes of 
temptation around it now. Its own tragedy may be 
briefly told. It was lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot ; 
and therefore it was loathsome in the sight of God. It 
was loved, and rebuked, and chastened in vain. And it 
has been blotted from the world. It is now as desolate 
as its inhabitants were destitute of the fear and love of 
God; and as the church of the Laodiceans was devoid 
of true faith in the Saviour, and zeal in his service, it is, 
as described in his Travels by Dr. Smith, " utterly deso- 
lated, and without any inhabitant, except wolves, and 
jackals, and foxes." It can boast of no human inhabit- 
ants, except occasionally when wandering Turkomans 
pitch their tents in its spacious amphitheatre. The 
" finest sculptured fragments" are to be seen at a con- 
siderable depth, in excavations which have been made 
among the ruins.* And Colonel Lake observes,! " there 
are few ancient cities more likely than Laodicea to pre- 
serve many curious remains of antiquity beneath the 
surface of the soil ; its opulence, and the earthquakes 
to which it was subject, rendering it probable that valua- 
ble works of art were often there buried beneath the 
ruins of the public and private edifices." A fearful sig- 
niflcancy is thus given to the terrific denunciation, " Be 
cause thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I 
will spue thee out of my mouth." 

"He that hath ears to hear, let him hear what the 
Spirit saith unto the churches." The Spirit searcheth 
all things, yea, the deep things of God. Each church, 
and each individual therein, was weighed in the balance 
of the sanctuary, according to their works. Each was 
approved of according to its character, or rebuked and 
warned according to its deeds. Was the church itself 
pure, the diseased members alone were to be cut off. 
Was the church itself dead, yet the few names in which 
there were life were all written before God, and not 
one of those who overcame would be blotted out of the 
book of life. All the seven churches were severally ex- 
horted by the Spirit according to their need. The faith 
delivered to the saints was preached unto them all ; and 
all, as Christian churches, possessed the means of salva- 
tion. The Son of man walked in the midst of them, 
beholding those who were and those who were not his. 

* Arundel's Travels, p. 85. f Journal, p. 252. 



THE SEVEN CHURCHES OF AfelA. 261 

By the preaching of the gospel, and by the written 
word, every man, in each of the churches, was warned, 
and every man was taught in all wisdom, that every 
man might be presented perfect in Christ Jesus. And 
in what the Spirit said unto each and all of the churches, 
which he that hath ears to hear was commanded to 
hear, the promise of everlasting blessedness, under a 
variety of the most glorious representations, was given 
without exception, restriction, or reservation to him that 
overcometh. The language of love, as well as of re- 
monstrance and rebuke, was urged even on the luke- 
warm Laodiceans. And if any Christian fell, it was 
from his own resistance and quenching of the Spirit ; 
from his choosing other lords than Jesus to have domin- 
ion over him ; from his lukewarmness, deadness, and 
virtual denial of the faith ; and from his own wilful re- 
jection of freely offered and dearly purchased grace ; 
sufficient, if sought and cherished, and zealously used, 
to have enabled him to overcome and triumph in that 
warfare against spiritual wickedness to which Christ 
hath called his disciples ; and in which, as the finisher 
of their faith, he is able to make the Christian more than 
conqueror. 

But if such as the Spirit described them and knew 
them to be were the churches and Christians then, 
what are the churches, and what are Christians now ? 
Or rather, we would ask of the reader, what is your 
own hope towards God, and what the work of your 
faith ] If, while Christianity was in its prime, and when 
its divine truths had scarcely ceased to reach the ears 
of believers from the lips of apostles, on whose heads 
the Spirit had visibly descended, and cloven tongues, 
like as of fire, had sat ; if, even at that time, one of the 
seven churches of Asia had already departed from its 
first love; if two others were partially polluted by the 
errors in doctrine, and evils in the practice, of some of 
their members ; if another had only a few names that 
were worthy, and yet another none ; and if they, who 
formed the last and worst of these, thought themselves 
rich and increased with goods, and that they had need 
of nothing ; and knew not that, being lukewarm, they 
were wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and 
naked ; have you an ear to hear or a heart to under- 
stand such knowledge ] and do you, professing yourself a 
Christian, as they alsc did, see no cause or warning here 



262 THE SEVEN CHURCHES OF ASIA. 

to question and examine yourself; even as the same Spirit 
would search and try you, of your works, and charity, 
and service, and faith, and patience, and thy works, and 
the last more than the first 1 

What is your labour of love, or wherein do you labour 
at all for his name's sake, by whose name you are 
called] What trials does your faith patiently endure, 
what temptations does it triumphantly overcome 1 Is 
Christ in you the hope of glory, and your heart purified 
through that blessed hope 1 To a church, we trust, you 
belong ; but whose is the kingdom within you 1 What 
principles ever actuate you which Christ and his apos- 
tles taught? Where, in your affections, and life, are 
the fruits of the Spirit — love, joy, peace, long-suffering, 
gentleness, goodness, meekness, temperance ] Turn 
the precepts of the gospel into questions, and ask thus, 
what the Spirit would say unto you, as He said unto 
the churches? 

What the Spirit said unto primitive and apostolic 
churches, over which " the beloved disciple" personally 
presided, may suffice to prove that none who have left 
their first love, if ever they have truly felt the love of 
Jesus — that none who are guilty of seducing others into 
sin and uncleanness — that none who have a name that 
they live, and are dead — and that none who are luke- 
warm, are worthy members of any Christian com- 
munion ; and that, while such they continue, no Chris- 
tian communion can be profitable to them. But unto 
them is " space to repent" given. And to them the 
word and Spirit speak in entreaties, encouragements, ex- 
hortations, and warnings ; that they may turn from their 
sins to the Saviour, and that they may live and not die. 
But were there one name in Sodom, or a few in Sardis, that 
are the Lord's, he knows and names them every one ; 
and precious in his sight is the death of his saints. 
Some, on the other hand, may be sunk into the depths 
of Satan, though in outward fellowship, with a church, 
were such to be found, as pure as once was that of 
Thyatira. Whatever, therefore, the profession of your 
faith may be, seek the kingdom of God and his right- 
eousness; that kingdom which is righteousness and 
peace and joy in the Holy Ghost, and that righteousness 
which is through faith in Christ, who gave himself for 
the church that he might sanctify and cleanse it. And 
whatever dangers may then encompass you around, fear 



THE SEVEN CHURCHES OF ASIA. 263 

not — only believe ; all things are possible to him that 
believeth. 

It was by keeping the word of the Lord, and not deny- 
ing his faith, by hearing what the Spirit said, that the 
church of Philadelphia held fast what they had, and no 
man took their crown, though situated directly between 
the church of Laodicea, which was lukewarm, and Sar- 
dis, which was dead. And dead as Sardis w T as, the Lord 
had a few names in it which had not defiled their gar- 
ments — Christians, worthy of the name, who lived, as 
you yourself should ever live, in the faith of the Lord 
Jesus— dead unto sin, and alive unto righteousness; 
while all around them, though naming the name of Jesus, 
were dead in trespasses and sins. Try your faith by its 
fruits ; judge yourselves that you be not judged ; ex- 
amine yourself whether you be in the faith ; prove your 
own self; and, with the whole counsel of God, as re- 
vealed in the gospel, open to your view, let the rule of 
your self-scrutiny be what the Spirit said unto the 
churches. 

If you have seen any wonderful things out of the law 
of the Lord, and have looked, though from afar off, on 
the judgments of God that have come upon the earth, 
lay not aside the thought of these things when you now 
lay down this little book. Treat them not as if they 
were an idle tale, or as if you yourself were not to be a 
witness — and more than a witness — of a far greater 
judgment which shall be brought nigh unto you, and 
shall be your own. 

If, in traversing some of the plainest paths of the field 
of prophecy, you have been led by a way which you 
knew not of before, let that path lead you to the well of 
Living waters, which springeth up into everlasting life 
to every one that thirsts after it and drinks. Let the 
words of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ be to you 
this well-spring of the Christian life. Let the word of 
God enlighten your eyes, and it will also rejoice jour 
heart. Search the Scriptures, in them are no lying divi- 
nations ; they testify of Jesus, and in them you will find 
eternal life. Pray for the teaching and the aid of that 
Spirit by whose inspiration they were given. And above 
all Christian virtues that may bear witness of your 
faith, put on charity, love to God, and love to man, the 
warp and woof of the Christian's new vesture without a 
seam ; even that charity, or love, bv which faith work- 



264 THE SEVEN CHURCHES OF Ab A 

eth; which is the fruit of the Spirit, the eitx of the 
commandment, the fulfilling of the law, the bond of per- 
fectness, and a better gift and a more excellent way than 
speaking with tongues, or interpreting or prophesying; 
and without which you would be as nothing, though you 
understood all mystery and all knowledge. From the 
want of this the earth has been covered with ruins. Let 
it be yours, and however poor may be your earthly 
portion, it will be infinitely more profitable to you than 
all the kingdoms of the world, and all their glory. Pro- 
phecies shall fail ; tongues shall cease ; knowledge shall 
vanish away ; the earth and the works that are therein 
shall be burned up ; but charity never faileth. 

If you have kept the word of the Lord, and have not 
denied his name, hold that fast which thou hast, that no 
man take thy crown. But if heretofore you have been 
lukewarm, and destitute of Christian faith, and zeal, and 
hope, and love, it would be vain in closing a chapter 
on such a subject to leave you with any mortal admoni- 
tion; hear what the Spirit saith, and harden not your 
heart against the heavenly counsel, and the glorious en- 
couragement given unto you by that Jesus of whom all 
the prophets bear witness, and unto whom all things are 
now committed by the Father : — " I counsel thee to buy 
of me gold tried in the fire, that thou mayest be rich ; 
and white raiment, that thou mayest be clothed, and 
that the shame of thy nakedness do not appear ; and 
anoint thine eyes with eye-salve, that thou mayest see 
As many as I love I rebuke and chasten ; be zealous, 
therefore, and repent. Behold I stand at the door and 
knock : if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I 
will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with 
me. To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with 
me in my throne, even as I also overcame, and am sat 
down with my Father in his throne. He that hath 
an ear to hear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto 
the churches,'" 



PROPHECIES OF DANIEL. 265 



CHAPTER IX. 

Daniel's prophecy of the things noted in the 
scripture of truth. 

There is a connected series of predictions, emphati- 
cally denominated the Things noted in the Scripture of 
Truth, which forms a commentary upon some of the 
more obscure prophecies — which give a condensed but 
precise account of the history of many kings — which 
marks the propagation, the persecution, the establish 
ment, and the corruptions of Christianity — and which, 
while it commences with the reign of Cyrus, who de- 
livered the Jews from their first captivity, describes, 
with the utmost precision, the rise, extent, and fall of 
that power which was to possess Judea in the latter 
times, previous to their final restoration. The pro- 
phecy is both local and chronological. It is descriptive 
of the government of the same identical region, and of 
the chief facts which relate to it, for many successive 
ages, and also of the spiritual tyranny which reigned 
for so long a period over Christendom. The events 
follow in succession, in the exact order of the prediction. 
They are not shadowed under types or figures, but 
foretold, in general, with the plainness of a narrative, 
and with the precision of facts. And Daniel relates 
them, not as delivered by him to others, but as declared 
in a vision to himself by an angel. These claims upon 
attention might well command it, even although the 
prophecy referred not, as it does, to a subject pecu- 
liarly interesting at the present critical period of the 
history of the world. 

To enumerate all the particulars would be to tran- 
scribe all the words of the prophecy ; — but they afford 
too conclusive an evidence to be passed over in silence. 
The observations of Sir Isaac Newton on this prophecy 
contain a circumstantial detail of the historical events, 
and of their application to the prediction. A succinct 



23 M 



266 MACEDONIAN EMPIRE. 

and general view may be here given. The prophecy 
includes the whole of the eleventh chapter of Daniel : — 

" And now I will show thee the truth. Behold there 
shall stand up three kings in Persia (Cambyses, and 
Darius Hystaspes), and the fourth (Xerxes) shall be far 
richer than they all ; and by his strength through his riches 
he shall stir up all against the realm of Grecia. And a 
mighty king (Alexander the Great) shall stand up, that 
shall rule with great dominion, and do according to his will. 
And when he shall stand up, his kingdom shall be broken, 
and shall be divided toivards the four ivinds of heaven : and 
not to his posterity, nor according to his dominion which he 
ruled : for his kingdom shall be plucked up, even for others 
besides those"* 

Soon after the death of Alexander the Great, his king- 
dom was divided towards the four winds of heaven, but 
not to his posterity; four of his captains, Ptolemy, 
Antigonus, Lysimachus, and Cassander, reigned over 
Egypt, Syria, Thrace, and Greece. The kingdoms of 
Egypt and of Syria became afterward the most powerful : 
they subsisted as independent monarchies for a longer 
period than the other two ; and, as they were more im- 
mediately connected with the land of Judea, which was 
often reduced to their dominion, they form the subject 
of the succeeding predictions.! Bishop Newton gives 
even a more copious illustration of the historical facts, 
which verify the whole of this prophecy, than that 
which had previously been given by his illustrious pre- 
decessor of the same name — who has rendered that 
name immortal. He quotes or refers to authorities in 
every instance : and his dissertation on that part of the 
prophecy which relates to the kingdoms of Syria and 
Egypt is wound up in these emphatic words ; " It may 
be proper to stop here, and reflect a little how particular 
and circumstantial this prophecy is concerning the king- 
doms of Egypt and Syria, from the death of Alexander 
to the time of Antiochus Epiphanes. There is not so 
complete and regular a series of their kings — there is 
not so concise and comprehensive an account of their 
affairs to be found m any author of these times. The 
prophecy is really more perfect than any history. No 
one historian hath related so many circumstances, and 
in such exact order of time, as the prophet hath foretold 

* Dan xi. 2, 3, 4> J Ibid. v. 5, 30. 



KINGS OF SYRIA AND EGYPT. 267 

them ; so that it was necessary to have recourse to 
several authors, Greek and Roman, Jewish and Chris- 
tian; and to collect here something from one, and tc 
collect there something from another, for better explain- 
ing and illustrating the great variety of particulars con- 
tained in this prophecy." So close is the coincidence 
between the prophetic and the real history of the kings 
of Egypt and of Syria, that Porphyry, one of the earliest 
opponents of Christianity, laboured to prove its extreme 
accuracy, and alleged from thence that the events must 
have preceded the prediction. The same argument is 
equally necessary at the present hour to disprove the 
subsequent parts of the same prophecy — though none 
can urge it now. The last of those facts to which it 
refers, the accomplishment of which is already past, are 
unfolded with equal precision and truth as the first — and 
the fulfilment of the whole is yet incomplete. The 
more clearly that the event corresponds to the predic- 
tion, instead of being an evidence against the truth, the 
more conclusive is the demonstration that it is the 
word of Him who hath the times and the seasons in his 
own power. 

The subject of the prophecy is represented in these 
words : — " I am come to make thee understand what 
shall befall thy people in the latter days ; for the vision 
is for many days."* And that which is noted in the 
Scripture of Truth terminates not with the reign of 
Antiochus. At that very time the Romans extended 
their conquests towards the East. Macedonia, the seat 
of the empire of Alexander the Great, became a province 
of the Roman empire. And the prophecy, faithfully 
tracing the transition of power, ceases to prolong the 
history of the kings of Egypt and of Syria, and becomes 
immediately descriptive of the progress of the Roman 
arms. The very term {shall stand up) which previously 
marked the commencement of the Persian and of the 
Macedonian power is here repeated, and denotes the 
commencement of a third era or a new power. The 
word in the original is the same in each. And arms 
(an epithet sufficiently characteristic of the extensive 
military power of the Romans) shall stand up, and they 
shall pollute the sanctuary of strength, and shall take away 
the daily sacrifice, and they shall place the abomination that 

* Dan. x. 14. 

M3 



268 SPIRITUAL TYRANNY 

maketh desolate.* All these things, deeply affecting the 
Jewish state, the Romans did — and they finally rendered 
the country of Judea " desolate of its old inhabitants." 
The propagation of Christianity — the succeeding impor- 
tant events — is thus represented: — The people that do 
know their God shall be strong and do exploits. And they 
that understand among the people shall instruct many. The 
persecutions which they suffered are as significantly 
described : — Yet they shall fall by the sword and by flame , 
by captivity and by spoil many days. Now, when they shall 
fall, they shall be holpen with a little help, and many shall 
cleave to them with flatteries. f And such was Constan- 
tine's conversion and the effect which it produced. No 
other government but that of the Romans stood up — but 
the mode of that government was changed. After the 
days of Constantine, Christianity became gradually more 
and more corrupted. Previous to that period there had 
existed no system of dominion analogous to that which 
afterward prevailed. The greatest oppressors had never 
extended their pretensions beyond human power, nor 
usurped a spiritual tyranny. But, in contradiction to 
every other, the next succeeding form of government, 
unparalleled in its nature, in the annals of despotism or 
of delusion, is thus characterized by the prophet : — And 
the king (the ruling power, signifying any government, 
state, or potentate) J shall do according to his will ; and he 
shall exalt himself and magnify himself above every god, 
and shall speak marvellous things against the God of gods, 
and shall prosper till the indignation be accomplished.^ 
This description is suited to the history of the Eastern or 
Western Churches — to the government under the Gre- 
cian emperors at Constantinople, or of the popes at 
Rome. The extent of the Roman empire might justify 
its application to the latter ; but the connexion of the 
prophecy, as referable to local events, tends to limit it 
to the former. In either case it is descriptive of that 
mode of government which prospered so long in the 
east and in the west — and which consisted in the impious 
usurpation of spiritual authority — in the blasphemous 
assumption of those attributes which are exclusively 
divine, and in exalting itself above the laws of God and 
man. But instead, perhaps, of being confined exclu- 
sively to either, it may have been intended to represent, 

* Dan. xi. 31. t Ibid. ver. 32, 33, 31, 35. 

t See Bishop Newton on this Prophecy, § Dan, xi. 36, &c. 



OF THE ROMISH CHURCH. 269 

as it does characterize, the spiritual tyranny, and the 
substitution of the commandments of men for the will 
of God, which oppressed Christendom for ages, and hid 
from men the w T ord of God. The prevalence of super- 
stition, the prohibition or discouragement of marriage, 
and the worship of saints, as characteristic of the same 
period and of the same power, are thus prophetically 
described : — " Neither shall he regard the God of his 
fathers nor the desire of ivomen (or matrimony), neither 
shall he regard any god.* But in his estate shall he honour 
the God of forces — mahuzzim — protectors or guardians, a 
term so applicable to the worship of saints and to the 
confidence which was reposed in them, that expressions 
exactly synonymous are often used by many ancient 
writers in honour of them — of which Mede and Sir 
Isaac Newton have adduced a multiplicity of instances. 
Mahuzzim were the tutelary saints of the Greek and 
Romish churches. The subserviency, which long ex- 
isted, of spiritual power to temporal aggrandizement, 
is also noted in the prophecy : and he shall cause them to 
rule over many, and shall divide the land for gain.\ And 
that the principal teachers and propagators of the wor- 
ship of Mahuzzim — " the bishops, priests, and monks, 
and religious orders, have been honoured, and reve- 
renced, and esteemed in former ages ; that their authority 
and jurisdiction have extended over the purses and con- 
sciences of men; that they have been enriched with 
noble buildings and large endowments, and have had the 
choicest of the lands appropriated for church lands ; — 
are points of such notoriety that they require no proof, 
and will admit of no denial." J 

Having thus described the antichristian power, which 
prospered so long and prevailed so widely, the prophecy 
next delineates, in less obscure terms, the manner hi 
which that power was to be humbled and overthrown, 
and introduces a more particular definition of the rise, 
extent, and fall of that kingdom which was to oppress 
and supplant it in the latter days. And at the time of the 
end shall the king of the south push at him.§ Tne Sara- 
cens extended their conquests over great part of Asia 
and of Europe : they penetrated the dominions of the 
Grecian empire, and partially subdued, though they 
could not entirely subvert it, nor obtain possession of 

* Dan jti 37 38 f Ibid. v. 39. J Bishop Newtor Z § Dan. xi. 40., 
23* 



270 TURKISH EMPIRE. 

Constantinople, the capital cit}^ The prediction, how- 
ever brief, significantly represents their warfare, which 
was desultory, and their conquest, which was incom- 
plete. And Arabia is situated to the south of Palestine. 
The Turks, the next and the last invaders of the Gre- 
cian empire, were of Scythian extraction, and came from 
the north.* And while a single expression identifies 
the Saracen invasion — the irruption of the Turks, 
being of a more fatal character and more permanent in 
its effects, is fully described. Every part of the descrip- 
tion is most faithful to the facts. Their local situation, 
the impetuosity of their attack, the organization of their 
armies, and the success of their arms, form the first part 
of the prediction respecting them. And the king of the 
north shall come against him like a whirlwind, with chariots 
and with horsemen and with many ships ; and he shall enter 
into the countries, and shall overflow and pass over.f Al- 
though the Grecian empire withstood the predatory 
warfare of the Saracens, it gave way before the over- 
whelming forces of the Turks, whose progress was 
tracked with destruction, and whose coming was indeed 
like a whirlwind. Chariots and horsemen were to be 
the distinguishing marks of their armies, though armies, 
in general, contain the greatest proportion of foot sol- 
diers. And, in describing their first invasion of the Gre- 
cian territory, Gibbon relates, that " the myriads of Turk- 
ish horse overspread a frontier of six hundred miles from 
Tauris to Arzeroum, and the blood of one hundred 
and thirty thousand Christians was a grateful sacrifice to 
the Arabian prophet.^ The Turkish armies at first con- 
sisted so exclusively of horsemen, that the stoutest of 
the youths of the captive Christians were afterward 
taken and trained as a band of infantry, and called jani- 
zaries (yengi cheri) or new soldiers."^ In apparent 
contradiction to the nature of their army, they were 
also to possess many ships. And Gibbon again relates, 
that " a fleet of two hundred ships was constructed by 
the hands of the captive Greeks."|| But no direct evi- 
dence is necessary to prove that many ships must have 
been requisite for the capture of so many islands, and 
the destruction of the Venetian naval power, which was 
once the most celebrated in Europe. " The words, shah 

* Gibbon's Hist. vol. iv. 136 ; vol. v. 527. f Dan. xi. 40. 

t Gibbon's Hist. vol. v. p. f-38, c. 57. ^ Ibid. vi. p. 297, c 64 

li Ibid. vol. v. d. 553. 



TURKISH EMPIRE. 271 

enter into the countries and overflow and pass over, give us 
an exact idea of their overflowing the western parts of 
Asia, and then passing over into Europe."* 

He shall enter also into the glorious land, and many conn" 
tries shall be overthrowing This expression, the glorious 
land, occurs in the previous part of this prophecy 
(v. 16), and, in both cases, it evidently means the land 
of Israel ; and such the Syriac translation renders it. 
The Holy Land formed part of the first conquest of the 
Turks. And many countries shall be overthrown.% The 
limits of the Turkish empire embraced the ancient king- 
doms of Babylon, Macedon, Thrace, Epirus, Greece, &c. 
and the many countries over which they ruled. The 
whole of Syria was also included, with partial excep- 
tions. These very exceptions are specified in the pro- 
phecy, though these territories partially intersect the 
Turkish dominions, and divide one portion of them from 
another, forming a singular contrast to the general con- 
tinuity of kingdoms. And, while every particular pre- 
diction respecting these separate states has been fully 
verified, their escaping out of the hands of the Turks has 
been no less marvellously fulfilled. But these shall 
escape out of his hand, even Edom and Moab, and the chief 
of the children of Ammon.§ Mede, Sir Isaac and Bishop 
Newton, in applying this prophecy to the Turkish em- 
pire, could only express, in general terms, that the Arabs 
possessed these countries, and exacted tribute from the 
Turks for permitting their caravans to pass through 
them. But recent travellers, among whom Volney has 
to be numbered, have unconsciously given the most 
satisfactory information, demonstrative of the truth of 
all the minutiae of the prediction. Volney describes 
these countries in part — Burckhardt traversed them all — 
and they have since been visited by other travellers.' 
Edom and Moab are in possession of the Bedouin (or 
wandering) Arabs. The Turks have often attempted in' 
vain to subjugate them. The partial escape of Amnion 
from their dominion is not less discriminating than just. 1 
For although that territory lies in the immediate vicinity 
of the pachalic of Damascus, to which part of it is sub- 
jected,— though it be extremely fertile by nature,— 
though its situation and its soil have thus presented, for 
several centuries, the strongest temptation to Turkish 

* Bishop Newton. t Da^- »■ 41 t ^id. $ Ibid. 



272 TURKISH Ex^lPlRE. 

rapacity, — though they have often attempted to subdue it, 
— yet no fact could have been more explicitly detailed, 
or more incidentally communicated, than that the in- 
habitants of the greater part of that country, particularly 
what adjoins the ancient but now desolate city of Am- 
nion, " live in a state of complete independence of the 
Turks."* 

He shall stretch forth his hand also upon the countries.^ 
How significantly do these words represent the vast 
extent of the Turkish empire, which alone has stretched 
its dominion over many countries of Asia, of Europe, 
and of Africa ] Ill-fated Egypt was not to escape from 
subjection to such a master. And the land of Egypt 
shall not escape ; but he shall have power over the treasures 
of gold and of silver, and over all the precious things of 
Egypt. % The Turks have drained Egypt of its wealth, 
of its gold and of its silver, and of its precious things : 
and such power have they exercised over them, that the 
kingdom of the Pharaohs, the land where everlasting 
pyramids were built, despoiled to the utmost, is now one 
of the poorest, as it has long been the basest, of king- 
doms. The Libyans and Ethiopians shall be at his steps. § 
These form the extremities of the Turkish empire, and 
were partially subject to its power. "After the con- 
quest of Egypt, the terror of Selim's victories," says the 
historian, " spreading wide, the kings of Africa, border- 
ing upon Cyrenaica, sent their ambassadors with offers 
to become his tributaries. Other more remote nations 
also towards Ethiopia were easily induced to join in 
amity with the Turks."|| Exclusive of Egypt, they still 
retain the nominal power over other countries of Africa. 
Such is the prophetic description of the rise and extent 
of that power which was to possess Judea in the latter 
days ; and it is a precise delineation of the rise and extent 
of the Turkish empire, to which Judea has been subject 
for centuries. 

Every succeeding fact, from the time of Cyrus to the 
present age, gives as sure a confirmation as the voice 
of an angel could have done, that the things noted in 
this prophecy are those of the Scripture of truth. His- 

* Buckingham's Travels, p. 325, 329, 337. Burekhardt's Travels in Nubia, 
p. 44 of Memoir. Letter to Sir Joseph Banks. Burckhardt's Travels i.\ 
Syria, p. 349, 355. 

t Dan. xi. 42. J Tbid. 43. § Ibid. 

1! Pauli Jovi Hist, quoted by Bishop Newton. 



CONCLUSION. 273 

tory mterpiets every part of it. It brings a multiplicity 
of witnesses, if we will listen to their testimony, from 
a long succession of ages, each arising to testify to its 
truth. And although the names of the countries be not 
mentioned, and the prophecy has received a variety of 
interpretations, yet we apprehend that it presents us, 
like every spot on earth which was the subject of Scrip- 
tural prophecies, with ocular demonstration that there 
is a God who ruleth among the nations ; and that the 
Christian religion, the purest and the best on earth, has 
that God for its author, 



CONCLUSION. 

The whole of the preceding brief and imperfect sketch 
forms little else than an enumeration of some of the 
more striking prophecies, and of facts which demonstrate 
their fulfilment ; and a recapitulation of all the particu- 
lars would be an unnecessary repetition. The nume- 
rous obscure prophecies which contain much and strik- 
ing evidence have hitherto been omitted, that the charge 
of ambiguity, too generally and indiscriminately attached 
to them all, might be proved to be unfounded. But, 
having seen, in hundreds of instances, that prophecies 
which were plainly delivered have been as clearly ful- 
filled, comprehending them all in a single argument, and 
leaving the decision to the enemies of Christianity, or to 
those who are weak in the faith, and appealing to their 
reason without bespeaking their favour, — may it not, in 
the first instance, be asked if it be an easy task which is 
assigned them, to disprove even this part of the positive 
evidence to the truth of the religion of Jesus. If they 
have ever staggered at the promises or threatenings of 
the Scriptures because of unbelief — discrediting all reve- 
lation from on high — can they not here discern super- 
natural evidence in confirmation of supernatural truths 1 
May not sight lead them to faith? Must they not con- 
cede that the Christian has some reason for the hope 
that is in him ? And may they not, at the very least, be 
led from thence to the calm and unprejudiced investiga- 
tion, not only of the other prophecies, but of all the evi- 
dence which Ch istianity presents ? 
M3 



274 CONCLUSION. 

It cannot be alleged, with truth, that the prophecies 
which have been selected are ambiguous ; that they 
bear the character of those auguries which issued from 
the cloud that always overhung the temple of Apollo, 
or of those pretended inspirations which emanated from 
the cave of Hera. It cannot be denied that they were 
all foretold hundreds or thousands of years before the 
events which even at the present day demonstrate their 
fulfilment, though every other oracle has ceased for 
ages to appeal to a single fact. And the historical and 
geographical facts, which were so clearly foretold, are, 
in general, of so wonderful a nature, that the language 
of prophecy, though expressive of literal truths, seems at 
first sight to be hyperbolical, and the prophecies of Isaiah 
in particular have been charged with being " full of ex- 
travagant metaphor ;" # the more extravagant the meta- 
phor, or the more remarkable the predicted fact, the 
further are the prophecies removed from all possibility 
of their having been the words of human invention. 

The following comprehensive and luminous statement 
of the argument, extracted from a review of the former 
edition of this treatise, is here so apposite, that no 
apology need be offered for inserting it at length. 

"This geographical argument (viz. the fulfilment of 
those prophecies which describe the future fate of par- 
ticular nations, and the future aspect of their countries) 
has always appeared to us one of the most impregnable 
strongholds of Christian prophecy ; or rather one of the 

* Were it not for the impiety with which they are conjoined, the remarks of 
Paine on the prophecies would, to those who have studied these at all, be suf- 
ficiently amusing. He characterizes the book of Isaiah as " one continued 
bombastical rant, full of extravagant metaphor, without application, and des- 
titute of meaning." The predictions respecting Babylon, Moab, &c. are, for- 
sooth, compared " to the story of the Knight of the Burning Mountain, the 
story of Cinderella," and such like. Isaiah, in short, " was a lying prophet 
and impostor." And " what can we say," he asks, " of these prophets, but 
that they were all impostors and liars ?" Such words are not merely harm 
less ; they may be also useful, as they show, that while every possible cor- 
roboration from history, fact, reason, and even the unconscious testimony of 
infidels themselves, is given to the truth of the prophecies; nothing can be 
alleged on the other hand but what in the sight of all men manifestly is 
" bombastical rant, and extravagant metaphor, without application, and des- 
titute of meaning." And since both speak not the truth, who is the liar? 
Isaiah the prophet or Paine the infidel? And "what can we say" of this 
stanch assertor of rights, but that his right to the title is undisputed, and 
that these very words of his, were others wanting, must in every " age of 
reason" rivet to his unblest memory the foul aspersions he so falsely applied ? 
Argument in such a case would be an idle waste of words. But while it would 
be an act of mere prodigality and folly to cast pearls before swine, the filth 
which they have snorted out may well be cast into their own kennel again, 
that they and their kind may partake of what pertains to them 



CONCLUSION. 275 

most resistless and wide-ranging instruments of aggres- 
sive evidence. There is no obscurity in the language 
of the prophet. There is no variety of opinion with 
regard to the object in his view. There is no denying 
of the change which he predicts. There is no challeng- 
ing of the witnesses who prove the facts of the case. 
The former glory of these regions and kingdoms is re- 
corded by ancient heathen historians, who knew nothing 
of the fall foretold. Their present state is described by 
recent and often infidel travellers, who knew often as 
little of the predictions which they were verifying by 
their narratives. It is not a particular event which has 
passed away, or a particular character who has perished, 
for whose era we must search in the wide page of his- 
tory, and of whose description we may find so many re- 
semblances as to become perplexed in our application. 
The places and the people are named by the prophet, 
and the state in which they now exist is matter of 
actual observation. The fulfilment of the prediction is 
thus inscribed as upon a public monument, which every 
man who visits the countries in question may behold 
with his own eyes ; and is expressed in a language so 
universally intelligible, that every man may be said to 
read it in his own tongue. To these scenes of Scripture 
prophecy we may point with triumph as to ocular demon- 
stration ; and say to the skeptical inquirer in the words 
of the evangelist, ' Come and see.' The multitude of 
travellers who have recently visited the Holy Land and 
the adjacent regions have furnished ample and authen- 
tic materials for the construction of so irrefragable an 
argument. Many of these travellers have discovered no 
intention of advocating by their statements the cause of 
revealed truth ; and some of them have been obviously 
influenced by hostility to its claims. Yet, in spite of 
these prejudices, and altogether unconsciously on their 
part, they have recorded the most express confirmation 
of the Scripture prophecies, frequently employing in 
their descriptions the very language of inspiration, and 
bringing into view (though evidently without design) 
those features of the scene which form the precise pic 
ture painted in the visions of the prophet." 

Willingly might the Christian here rest his assurance 
" in the faith once delivered to the saints," and leave to 
the unbeliever his hopeless creed. But the reasonings 
of one class of infidels must be combined with the re- 



276 CONCLUSION. 

searches of another to give full force to the Evidence of 
Prophecy : and they jointly supply both the clearest facts 
and the strongest arguments, and have made ready the 
means which need only to be applied for bringing the 
controversy with them, in its various bearings, and in 
their own words, to a short issue. 

The metaphysical speculations of Hume,* and the 
mathematical demonstrations of La Place, which have 
been directed against the credibility of the miracles, 
rest entirely on the " Theory of Probability" Assuming 
its logical and legitimate application to the testimony 
of any supernatural evidence of a divine revelation, it is 
argued that the improbabilities of the occurrence of 
miracles, being contradictory to uniform experience, are 

* It may not be here amiss to allude to that kind and courteous admonition 
to Christian writers so meekly given, and with wisdom rivalling its modesty, 
by this great master of ideal philosophy, in which, in order perhaps to bring 
their arguments to cope the better with his own, he prescribes to them, as 
best suited to their cause, the total rejection of reason ! After quoting a passage 
from Lord Bacon's works, which has a very different application, he adds— 
This method of reasoning (about monsters, magic, and alchymy, &c.) may serve 
to confound those dangerous friends or disguised enemies of the Christian 
religion who have undertaken to defend it by the 'principles of human reason. 
Our most holy religion is founded on faith, not on reason; and it is a sure 
method of exposing it, to put it to such a trial as it is by no means fitted to 
endure. --{Hume's Essays § 10, v. h. p. 136-7, Ed. Edin. 1800.) If these 
words may not justly be retorted against the " unbeliever's creed," exclud- 
ing the epithet of holy ; or if Mr. David Hume was better acquainted with the 
principles of the Christian religion than the Author of it, who appealed to the 
reason of men, and asked them why they did not of themselves judge that 
which was right, and than the apostles Peter and Paul, who enjoin Christians 
to try all things, and to hold fast to that which is good, and to be able to give 
an answer to every one that asketh them a reason of the hope that is in them ; 
then the writer of this treatise, having only the hard alternative of being either 
" a dangerous friend or a disguised enemy of the Christian religion," would, 
with whatever reluctance, prefer the former, and has to lament the evil he 
has done, and the "sure method" he has taken of "exposing it." And 
although he may hope that Christians in their charity will forgive him, he 
must yet leave to unbelievers the comfort and the joy of the triumph, which 
in the exercise of that reason which they have monopolized, these pages must 
necessarily give them. Or if, on the other hand, in somewhat stricter accord 
ance with the truths of Scripture, the author of the Essay on Human Nature 
supplies, by the prefixed words, as clear practical proof," in his " Academical 
Philosophy," or Skepticism in Theory, that it is one of the characteristics of 
the heart of man to be deceitful above all things, as mere worldly wisdom 
and infidelity in practice too frequently demonstrate that it is also desperately 
wicked . and if Scripture prophecy can "endure the trial of reason," and its 
evidence be rejected — then the disciples of Hume, the traducers of the Chris- 
tian religion — as not founded on reason, holding to " human nature," as of 
itself it is, and deriding the idea of its proffered ransom from the guilt, and 
rescue from the power of sin, have need, without exhausting their reason in 
abstract speculations, to look to their own harder alternative, and (if both be 
not possibly conjoined) to choose between the incomparable deceitfulness and 
desperate wickedness of the heart within — evils greater far than all that the 
Christian can ever fear for himself from all the sneers of the sophist, or tha 
railings of the ungodly. 



CONCLUSION. 277 

so extreme as to destroy entirely the validity of any 
testimony to their truth which has been transmitted 
through so many ages. " And upon the whole, we may 
conclude," says Hume, "that the Christian religion, 
even at this day, cannot be believed by any reasonable 
person without a miracle." What then is the evidence, 
that, even at this day, there are subsisting miracles 
which must command the belief of every person to the 
truth of the Christian religion, who is not so utterly unrea- 
sonable, and his mind so steeled against conviction, as 
not to be persuaded even by miraculous demonstration 1 
And in what better or less exceptionable " method" can 
this evidence be meted out than according to the very 
" measure of probability" in use with unbelievers ; and 
by means of which they profess to have discovered the 
deficiency of testimony to the truth of ancient miracles 1 

Archimedes demanded only a spot whereon to stand 
that he might move the world. If the most reasonable 
concession from the infidel be not as impossible to be 
obtained as the demand of Archimedes, and if he will 
admit either the truth of his own principles or the force 
of mathematical proof, or if his prejudices be not im- 
moveable as a world, the existing and obvious fulfilment 
of a multiplicity of prophecies might well excite his at- 
tention, and convince him of the truth. 

The doctrine of chances, or calculation of probabilities, 
has been reduced into a science, and is now in various 
ways of great practical use, and securely acted upon in 
the affairs of life. But it is altogether impossible that 
short-sighted man could select, from the infinite multi- 
tude of the possible contingencies of distant ages, any 
one of such particular facts as abound in the prophecies ; 
and it is manifest, that upon the principle of probabili- 
ties, the chance would be incalculable against the suc- 
cess of the attempt, even in a single instance. Each 
accomplished prediction is a miracle. But the advocate 
for Christianity may safely concede much, and reduce 
his data to the lowest terms. And if the unbeliever 
reckon not his own cause utterly hopeless, and " by no 
means fitted to endure the trial of reason," he must grant 
that there was as great a probability that each prediction 
would not as that it would have been fulfilled ; or that 
the probabilities were equal for and against the occur- 
rence of each predicted event. The Christian may fear* 
lesslv descend to meet him even on this very lowly 
24 



278 CONCLUSION. 

ground. And, without enumerating all the particulars 
included in the volume of prophecy respecting the life 
and character and death of Christ — the nature and 
extent of Christianity, &c. — the destruction of Jerusa- 
lem — the fate of the Jews in every age and nation — the 
existing state of Judea, of Ammon, Moab, Edom, Philis- 
tia, Babylon, Tyre, Egypt, the Arabs, &e.,the Church of 
Rome, and the prophetic history which extends through- 
out two thousand three hundred years; may it not be 
assumed (though fewer would suffice, and though incon- 
testable evidence has been adduced to prove more than 
double the number) that a hundred different particulars 
have been foretold and fulfilled. What, then, even upon 
these data, is the chance, on a calculation of probabilities, 
that all of them would have proved true, — the chance 
diminishing one-half for every number (or what, in 
other words, is the hundredth power of two to unity) ?* 
Such is the desperate hazard to which the unbeliever 
would trust, that even from these premises, it is mathe- 
matically demonstrable that the number of chances is far 
greater against him than the number of drops in the 
ocean, although the whole world were one globe of 
water. Let the chance at least be counted before it be 
confided in. But who would risk a single mite against 
the utmost possible gain, at the stake on which unbe- 
lievers here recklessly put to certain peril the interests 
of eternity. 

But each prediction recorded in Scripture, being a 
miracle of knowledge, is equal to any miracle of power, 
and could have emanated only from the Deity. "All 
prophecies are real miracles, and as such only can be 
admitted as proof of any revelation."! They may even 
be said to be peculiarly adapted, in the present age of 

* Essai Philosophique sur les Probability. Par M. Le Comte La Place. 
Emerson on Chances, prop. 3. Hutton's edit, of Ozanam's Mathemat. 
Recr. v. i 

t Hume's Essays, vol. ii. p. 137. This statement of Hume's, combined 
with the manifest truth of prophecy, shows how all his theory against the 
truth 3i" miracles may easily be overthrown by an admission of his own 
Prophecy being true, and uniformly true, and all prophecies being real mira- 
cles, miracles are not contrary to universal, or even, in a restricted sense, to 
uniform experience. They " are rendered probable by so many analogies" 
(Ibid. p. 134), that on sufficient testimony they become proveable, even upon 
Hume's own principles, especially when the inspiration of those very Scrip- 
tures which record the disputed miracles is verified by other miracles, the 
truth of which is established and experienced. And thus the boldest dogmas 
of skepticism may not only be braved but reversed ; and it is more wonderful 
that the testimony, sealed in blood and rendered credible by miracles equally 
great, should be false* than that the mirzcles should be hue.. 



CONCLUSION. 279 

extended knowledge and enlightened inquiry, for being 
" the testimony of Jesus ;" and they cannot justly be 
viewed as of inferior importance or authority to any 
miracles whatever. 

Though the founder of a new religion, or the mes- 
senger of a divine revelation, and his immediate follow- 
ers, who had to promulgate his doctrine, would give 
clear and unequivocal proof, by working miracles, that 
their commission was from on high; yet, the relation 
between any miraculous event, wrought in after-ages, 
and a religion previously established, might not be so 
apparent. Or, even if it were, yet any single and tran- 
sient act of superhuman power, being confined to a par- 
ticular region, and cognizable only by a limited num- 
ber, the testimony of these witnesses would be regarded 
only as secondary evidence, and could not, at least in a 
Christian land, be substantiated by proof so complete as 
that which was sealed by the blood of martyrs. And 
even if perpetual manifestations of miraculous power 
(however much men in apparent vindication of their 
unbelief may unreasonably ask such proof) were sub- 
mitted to the inspection and experience of each indi- 
vidual in every age, they would only seem to distort the 
order and frame of nature, and by thus disturbing the 
regularity and uniformity of her operations, would, from 
their very frequency, cease to be regarded as supernatural ; 
and, influenced by the same skeptical thoughts, those 
who now demand a sign would then be the first to dis- 
credit it. And true to reason and to nature it is, that 
those who will not believe Moses and the prophets 
would not be persuaded though one rose from the dead. 
For the prophecies bear a direct reference to religion 
that is easily comprehended, and that cannot be misap- 
plied. They have a natural and obvious meaning that 
may be known and read of all men. " Thus saith the 
Lord", is their prefix ; this is the fact, is their proof. 
Instead of being weakened by the greatness of their 
number, the more they are multiplied, or the more fre- 
quently that facts formerly unknown, or events yet 
future, spring up in their verification, their evidence is 
redoubled, and they are ever permanent and existing 
witnesses that the word is of God. And, further, the 
testimony which, in every passing age, confirms their 
truth cannot be cavilled at : it is not " diluted by trans- 
mission through many ages ;" it is borne, not to events 



280 CONCLUSION. 

in themselves miraculous, but to natural facts, whether 
historical or geographical, which have been proved by 
conclusive evidence, and which in numerous instances 
still subsist to stand the test of any inquiry. And even 
many of the facts (such as the whole history of the ex- 
patriated Jews) are witnessed by all, and need no testi- 
mony whatever to declare them. And the records of 
the prophecies, preserved throughout every age by the 
enemies of Christianity, are in every hand. If, then, no 
evidence less exceptionable, more conclusive, or more 
clearly miraculous could be given, the disciples of Hume, 
in resigning an " academic" for a Christian faith, have 
only to apply aright the words of their master — " A wise 
man proportions his belief to the evidence,"* and they 
may thus find — what he in vain thought that he had dis- 
covered — an " everlasting check" against " delusion."! 

It was the boast of Bolingbroke, in summing up his 
" Philosophical" labours, that " he had pushed inquiry 
as far as the true means of inquiry are open, that is, as 
far as phenomena could guide him." Christian philoso- 
phy asks no more. It lays open the " means of inquiry,' 
and presents, in the fulfilment of many prophecies, " phe- 
nomena" more wonderful than external nature ever ex- 
hibited, and demands only integrity of purpose, and that 
"inquiry be pushed unto the uttermost," that candour 
and reason may thus guide the impartial inquirer, by the 
light of positive evidence and miraculous proof, to the 
conviction and acknowledgment of the inspiration of the 
Scriptures. 

The argument drawn by Volney from " The Ruin of 
Empires" is completely controverted by facts stated by 
himself, which, instead of militating against religion, 
directly establish the truth of prophecy; — and the un- 
substantial fabric which he raised needs no other hand 
but his own to lay in the dust. 

But ridicule alone has often supplanted reason, and 
has been held as a test of the truth, and directed espe- 
cially against the prophecies. And may not an evidence 
of their inspiration be found even in this last retreat of 
infidelity ? The ruins of the moral world are as obvious 
in the sight of Omniscience as the ruins of the natural — 
of cities or of kingdoms ; and his word can foretel the 
one as well as the other. And if those who scoff at 

* Hume's Essay on Miracles, vol. ii. p. 117. \ Ibid. p. 116. 



CONCLUSION. 281 

religion can perceive no evidence from any historical 
facts, or any external objects, they might look within, 
and they would find engraven on their own hearts, in 
characters sufficiently legible, a confirmation of the pro- 
phecies. And if they substitute railing for reason, and 
think to mar religion with their mockery, to all others 
they stand convicted the living witnesses of the truth. 
" There shall come, in the last days, scoffers, walking 
after their own lusts, and saying, Where is the promise 
of his coming'? for, since the fathers fell asleep, all 

THINGS CONTINUE AS THEY WERE FROM THE BEGINNING OF THE 

creation. For this they wilfully are ignorant of that, 
by the Word of God, the heavens were of old, and the 
earth standing out of the water and in the water, whereby 
the world that then was perished." "There shall be 
mockers in the last time."* 

* 2 Peter iii. 3. Jude v. 18. 

The Christian religion has thus to rank among its enemies many false 
teachers who were to arise, and who, as characterized in Scripture, speak evil 
of the things that they understand not, who despise government, who are 
presumptuous and self-willed, who speak gi eat swelling words of vanity to 
allure others, promising them liberty, while they themselves are the children 
of corruption, and foaming out their shame. — 2 Peter, chap. i. verses 1, 10, 12, 
18. Blasphemy, obscenity, and unmeaning abuse are the weapons of their 
warfare: they seek to debase religion into a conformity with their gross and 
grovelling imaginations, speaking of things that they know not, they utter 
great swelling words of vanity as if by a mere glance of their jaundiced 
mental vision they could compass at once the whole of religious truth. But 
their arguments are as weak as their principles are base. And so manifestly 
does reason disclaim them, that for subverting their false assumptions, it is 
only necessary, in general, to make the contradiction as flat as the assertion 
is positive. As an example, it may be remarked, that in a list of aphorisms 
which lately issued from the London mart of infidelity, the most specious of 
the whole was thus expressed : — "All other religions are false, and, therefore, 
the Christian religion is false also," or, as the argument may be more logically 
stated, — all other religions are false, and, therefore, the Christian religion is 
true. Yet who can look but with sorrow for the fate, as well as disgust and 
derision at the efforts of such pitiful cavillers, carping at the truth of the Chris- 
tian religion — like unto foul and small fry (the less dignified the more befitting 
is the simile) nibbling at some weeds that have been cast by human hands 
upon a rock, and pressing with all their little strength to move it. 

But there is another and a different class of unbelievers, to whom the 
words in the text no less strikingly apply ; for they may be brought to confute 
the subtlest arguments of the ingenious skeptic, as well as to condemn the 
profane mockery of the most senseless railer. The great argument of in- 
fidelity, urged so strenuously in these last days, against the credibility of 
miracles, from the inviolability of the laws of nature, could not be more 
plainly or forcibly stated than in the words of the apostle, declaring what 
that argument, the result of modern science, would be. If it had not been 
urged, a part of Christian evidence, derived from the fulfilment of this pre- 
diction, would still have been wanting, and we would still have had to wait 
Or the last argument of infidelity, from whence to draw a new illustration of 
the truth. But the apostle not only states, he also confutes, what scoffers in 
the last days would say, and not from Scriptural authority, unavailing with 
them, but on philosophical principles, or from facts of which they are willingly 
ignorant, — viz. the creation of the world, and its having been overflowed by 
24* 



282 CONCLUSION. 

But if unbelievers lay just claim to wisdom, and make 
a fair appeal to reason, then, rather than place their 
security in abstract speculations, and tamper thus with 
the immortal hopes of their fellow-men, rather than 
trust in ridicule as the test of religious truth, and call 
an assumed and yet unpaid license to blasphemy by the 
name of liberty — does it not behoove them to look first 
to the positive evidence and miraculous proof of reve- 
lation, to detect its fallacy or own its power, and to quit 
their frail intrenchments, if, indeed, they find that the 
standard of Christian faith may, in despite of all their 
efforts, be fixed upon the proudest towers of infidelity ? 
Let them, in the words of the prophet, bring forth their 
witnesses, that they may be justified, or let them hear, 
and say it is truth. 

But, in conclusion, it may in reason be asked, if there 
be not something repugnant to the principles of Chris- 
tianity in the mind of that man who will not hear Moses 
and the prophets, and who is slow of heart to believe all 
that they have spoken, though they afforded the means 
of detection in every prediction which they uttered, if 
their prophecies had been false — though they appealed 
to a vast variety of events which distant ages would 
bring into existence — though history has answered, and 
ocular demonstration has confirmed that appeal, our 
enemies themselves being witnesses — and although there 
never was any other truth that could be tried by such a 
test 1 Might he not be convinced of a doctrine less 
moral, or not quite according to godliness, by evidence 
less miraculous ] Is there no reason to fear that the 

water, which show that all things are not as they were at the beginning- of the 
creation. Hume, Bentham, and La Place must yet veil their heads, in the 
academy as well as in the temple, before the humble fisherman of Galilee. 
A.nd their reasonings need only to be rightly applied, that they may as strongly 
advocate the undoubted evidence which miracles give that the doctrine is of 
God, as the facts attested by Gibbon and Volney demonstrate that the pro- 
phecies of Scripture were given by inspiration of God. — But such a subject 
can only be touched on in a concluding note ; and abundant is the evidence of 
prophecy, seeing that it here needs only to be thus noticed. The transference 
of the leading argument of infidelity, — which a text and a fact may suffice to 
transfer, — into an additional and fundamental evidence of the truth, merits a 
more full consideration, which it is the purpose of the writer to endeavour to 
give in a general and connected view of the Evidences of Christianity, which 
he is preparing for the press, and which he hopes to be able to compress in a 
small compass, in the form of such a manual as the present. In the mean 
time, this new method of dealing with the Deist is here referred to, that it may 
be free to every Christian's use; for it rests not on human invention, but is 
drawn from the infallible word of the living God — the same Scriptures which, 
to all who search them, are ever full of treasures, and in which are to bo 
found the words of eternal life 



CONCLUSION. 283 

ligh of evidence, though sufficient to dispel the cloud 
upon the understanding, is yet unable to penetrate " the 
veil upon the heart." Skepticism, at best, is not a sub- 
ject for boasting. It is easy to exclude the noontide 
light by closing the eyes ; and it is easy to resist the 
clearest truth by hardening the heart against it. And 
while, on the other hand, there are minds (and New- 
ton's was among the number) which are differently 
affected by the evidence of prophecy, and which cannot 
be callous when touched by the concentrated rays of 
such light from heaven, whence can this great dissimi- 
larity of sentiment arise from the same identical and 
abundant proof] And into what else can the want of 
conviction be resolved than into the Scriptural solution 
of the difficulty — an evil heart of unbelief] " They will 
not come unto the light because the light would make 
them free." 

But while the unbeliever rejects the means of con- 
viction, and rests his hope on the assumed possibility 
that his tenets may be true — the positive evidence of 
Christianity convinces the unprejudiced inquirer, or 
rational and sincere believer, that it is impossible that 
his faith can be false. And when he searches out of the 
book of the Lord, and finds that none of them do fail, hu 
looks on every accomplished prediction, even though it 
be the effect of the wrath of man, as a witness of God — 
he knows in whom he believes — he sees the rise and fall 
of earthly potentates and the convulsions of kingdoms, 
testifying of Him who ruleth among the nations, and 
accrediting his word — he experiences the conviction that 
the most delightful of all truth, the hope which perisheth 
not, is confirmed by the strongest of all testimony, that 
heaven itself hath ratified the peace which it hath pro- 
claimed — he rests assured that prophecy came not of 
old time by the will of man, but that holy men of old 
spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost — and, 
although he knows not the mode of the operations of the 
Spirit, he sees the demonstration of his power. And 
" taking heed thus unto the sure word of prophecy until 
the day dawn and the day-star arise in his heart" the 
true believer learns, from the things that are past, 
the certainty of the things that are to come hereafter — 
he rests not satisfied with a mere name that he liveth, 
while yet he might be dead — but, having obtained that 
" precious faith," the germ of immortality, which springeth 



284 CONCLUSION. 

up into eternal life, he experiences the power of the 
world to come, and unites the practice with the profes- 
sion of religion — he copies the zeal of those who spend 
their strength for that which is in vain, and their labour 
for that which proflteth not, but he directs it to the 
attainment of an incorruptible inheritance — for he knows 
that his labour shall not be in vain while he yields obe- 
dience to that Word which is the charter of his salva- 
tion, and which so unequivocally bears the seal and 
superscription of the King of kings. 



THE END. 



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